FORMER MP Angela Smith is to be made a member of the House of Lords.
The former Labour minister of state is to be made a life peer after being recommended by former Prime Minister Gordon Brown to the Queen.
Mrs Smith grew up in Basildon and is a former Pitsea Junior School and Chalvedon School pupil.
She served as Basildon’s MP from 1997 and worked closely with Mr Brown as a Parliamentary Private Secretary, until being ousted by Tory Stephen Metcalfe in this year’s general election.
