Elizabeth Andrews

TEACHER, LABOUR PARTY’S FIRST WOMAN ORGANISER FOR WALES, COUNCILLOR

Elizabeth Andrews, born into a mining family in Penderyn, shared a deep commitment to the labour party with her husband Thomas T. Andrews, one of the founders of the Rhondda branch of the Independent Labour Party. Elizabeth was the Labour Party’s first Women’s Organiser for Wales from 1919-1947 and in 1919 she and two miners’ wives gave evidence before the Sankey Commission, to persuade the mine owners and the Government that pithead baths were essential. Elizabeth’s motto was ‘education, aggravation and organisation’ and her actions led to the first Nursery School in the Rhondda opening in the 1930s. In 1949 she was awarded an OBE and in 1957 published her life story – A Woman’s Work is Never Done.