Natalie Fleet has quit the safeguarding minister role, saying the work was overwhelmingly triggering and was making her ill.
Natalie Fleet has stepped down as safeguarding minister after saying the work became overwhelmingly triggering for her. The Labour MP told the BBC the role was making her ill and said she had told Andy Burnham’s new team that she sadly could not stay in the job.
Fleet, who was appointed on May 12 after Jess Phillips resigned, said the decision was the bravest thing she has ever done. She also said she offered support to the person who replaces her. On X, she wrote that it had been an honour to serve, but that she had quickly found the contents of the job too triggering.
In her BBC interview, Fleet said a safeguarding minister hears “the worst of humanity,” and that she understood what it meant not to be seen or heard. She said the role matters deeply and that it needs a good and competent minister. Fleet added that she had support from the Home Office while in post, but said that even with that help the nature of the job had taken a toll on her.
Fleet has spoken publicly before about being groomed and raped as a teenager. In a 2024 interview with GB News, she said she became pregnant at 15 after being abused by an older man and said she still has weekly nightmares about what happened. She told the broadcaster that she did not understand they were having unprotected sex and described what happened as statutory rape. Fleet later said her daughter is the absolute love of her life.
She was elected MP for Bolsover in July 2024, taking the seat from Labour veteran Dennis Skinner. In her maiden Commons speech in October 2024, she said it was her duty to speak for women in her Derbyshire constituency whose stories were not being told. Burnham has not yet announced all of his ministerial appointments, and Fleet said she would like another government job if offered one. If not, she said she would return to Labour’s backbenches and keep campaigning for survivors. The plain fact is that the safeguarding minister role can carry a heavy personal cost, even for those determined to serve.
Sources
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