Ruth Runciman
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Ruth Runciman, Viscountess Runciman of Doxford {{post-nominals|country=GBR|DBE}} (née Hellman; born 9 January 1936), known as Dame Ruth Runciman, is a former Chair of the British Mental Health Act Commission.{{cite book|page=1809|work=Who's Who|publisher=A & C Black|year=2001|title=Runciman of Doxford, Viscountess; Ruth Runciman}}
Early life
Hellman was educated at Roedean School, Johannesburg, and the Witwatersrand University, also in Johannesburg, where she gained a baccalaureate degree. She then matriculated at Girton College, Cambridge, in England{{Cite web|url=http://thepeerage.com/p56342.htm#i563420|title=Person Page|website=thepeerage.com}}
Career
Runciman became active in public life after marriages and children. In 1981, she was one of the founders of the Prison Reform Trust and was responsible for setting up a full-time Citizens' Advice Bureau in Wormwood Scrubs, the first full-time independent advice agency in any prison. She also became a Trustee of the Pilgrim Trust and the National AIDS Trust (now known as NAT), and chaired it from 2000 to 2006. {{cite web|title=Truestees' Report and Accounts|url=http://www.thepilgrimtrust.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Pilgrim-Trust-2010-annual-report-and-accounts.pdf|publisher=The Pilgrim Trust}}
For more than three decades, Runciman worked with the Citizens Advice Bureau and made significant contributions to work on drug misuse.{{Cite web|title=Drugs and the Law: 'REPORT OF THE INDEPENDENT INQUIRY INTO THE MISUSE OF DRUGS ACT 1971|date=28 March 2000 |url=http://www.police-foundation.org.uk/publication/inquiry-into-drugs-and-the-law/|publisher=The Police Foundation|access-date=10 June 2020}}
She was Chair of Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust for more than ten years, retiring at the end of 2013.{{cite news|title=New chair for NHS Foundation Trust who will overlook centres in Milton Keynes|url=http://www.mkweb.co.uk/Health/New-chair-for-NHS-Foundation-Trust-with-base-in-Milton-Keynes-20140111110000.htm|accessdate=11 January 2014|newspaper=MK Web|date=11 January 2014}}
Personal life
Between 1959 and 1962 she was married to Denis Mack Smith, a Cambridge historian of the Italian "Risorgimento".
In 1963, she married the British sociologist Walter Garrison Runciman, becoming Viscountess Runciman of Doxford, a title she does not use. Runciman died on 10 December 2020. Their son David, who then inherited the peerage, was until 2024 a professor of politics at the University of Cambridge.{{Cite web|url=http://www.polis.cam.ac.uk/Staff_and_Students/professor-david-runciman|title=David Runciman|date=26 September 2013 |publisher=Department of Politics and International Studies (POLIS), University of Cambridge|accessdate=10 April 2018}}
Honours
- Officer of the Order of the British Empire, 1991.
- Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire, 1998, for services to mental health.{{cite web|title=Queen's Birthday honours 1998|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/queens-birthday-honours-1998-1164586.html|work=The Independent|date=12 June 1998}}
- Honorary Fellow of the University of Central Lancashire, 2000.{{cite web|title=Honorary Fellows 1992-2009 Fellows|url=http://www.uclan.ac.uk/corporate_information/honorary_fellows.php|publisher=The University of Central Lancashire}}
References
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External links
- [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/forum/1618154.stm Profile] BBC.co.uk; accessed 12 July 2014.
- [https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm199900/cmselect/cmhaff/561/0060802.htm Parliament publications #1]; accessed 12 July 2014.
- [https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm199900/cmselect/cmhaff/561/0060806.htm Parliament publications #2]; accessed 12 July 2014.
- [http://www.cnwl.org/CNWLBoard.html Central and North West London Mental Health Trust], cnwl.org; accessed 12 July 2014.
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Category:Alumni of Roedean School, South Africa
Category:Health professionals from London
Category:Fellows of Girton College, Cambridge
Category:British social welfare officials
Category:British women academics
Category:20th-century British educators
Category:20th-century British women educators
Category:21st-century British educators
Category:British viscountesses
Category:Dames Commander of the Order of the British Empire
Category:People involved with mental health
Category:Place of birth missing (living people)