Dido Harding

Dido Harding

Diana Mary Dido Harding, Baroness Harding of Winscombe is a British Conservative Party businesswoman. She is a former chief executive of the TalkTalk Group where she faced calls for her to resign after a cyber attack revealed the details of four million customers. Harding is married to Conservative Party Member of Parliament John Penrose and is a friend of former Prime Minister David Cameron.

About Dido Harding in brief

Summary Dido HardingDiana Mary \”Dido\” Harding, Baroness Harding of Winscombe is a British Conservative Party businesswoman. She is a former chief executive of the TalkTalk Group where she faced calls for her to resign after a cyber attack revealed the details of four million customers. Harding is married to Conservative Party Member of Parliament John Penrose and is a friend of former Prime Minister David Cameron. She holds a board position at the Jockey Club, which is responsible for several major horse-racing events including the Cheltenham Festival. In May 2020, Harding was appointed by Health Secretary Matt Hancock to head NHS Test and Trace, established to track and help prevent the spread of COVID-19 in England. In February 2017, Harding announced that she would stand down as CEO of TalkTalk in order to focus more on her public service activities. She was appointed as a Member of the House of Lords as a Conservative life peer on 20 October 2014.

She has not rebelled against her party on any of the votes she has attended during her time in the House. In October 2017 she was appointed chairwoman of NHS Improvement, responsible for overseeing all NHS hospitals, as well as independent-funded care providers. In November 2020, a case was lodged by the Good-for-profit Law and Law Society against Harding being put in charge of the NHS test and trace programme as part of the government’s response to the CO VID-19 pandemic. In August 2020, after it was announced Public Health England was to be abolished, Harding was appointed interim chair of the new National Institute for Health Protection. Her grandfather was Field Marshal John Harding, 1st Baron Harding of Petherton, who commanded the Desert Rats in World War II. Her father was John Charles Harding, 2nd Baron Harding.