Editing Barbara Castle (section)

==Life peer==
In 1974 [[Edward Castle, Baron Castle|Ted Castle]] was made a life peer.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JcastleT.htm |title=Ted Castle |publisher=Spartacus Educational |date=16 December 1979 |access-date=24 June 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081004174228/http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JcastleT.htm |archive-date=4 October 2008}}</ref> This meant that Barbara was now formally Lady Castle, though she chose not to use this courtesy title. Ted Castle died in 1979. On 16 July 1990 she was created a [[life peer]] in her own right, as Baroness Castle of Blackburn, of [[Ibstone]] in the [[Buckinghamshire|County of Buckingham]]shire.<ref>{{London Gazette |issue=52215 |date=19 July 1990 |page=12091}}</ref> She remained active in politics up until her death, attacking the then [[Chancellor of the Exchequer|Chancellor]], [[Gordon Brown]], at the Labour party conference in 2001 for his refusal to link pensions to earnings.

Castle was a critic of [[Blairism]] and "[[New Labour]]", in particular on economic policy, which she perceived as involving acceptance of "[[market economics]], unchallenged [[globalization]] and the dominance of the [[Multinational corporation|multinationals]]".<ref name="NewStatesman"/> She also accused Blairites of distorting and dismissing the Labour Party's past, stating in an interview published in the ''[[New Statesman]]'' in 2000, the year of the party's centenary:
{{blockquote|They do not seem to have realised that all governments, whatever their complexion, end in apparent failure. [[Harold Macmillan|Macmillan]] was triumphant in 1959 and was biting the dust shortly afterwards. [[Edward Heath|Heath]] won in 1970, and spent three and half years doing U-turns, looking for the perfect answer. [[Margaret Thatcher|Thatcher]] was a remarkable woman, but her premiership ended in ignominy. But the current leadership seems preoccupied by the failing of Labour in power and in opposition."<ref name="NewStatesman"/>}}