Born in London to a doctor and a barrister, Harman was privately educated at St Paul's Girls' School before going on to study politics at the University of York.

After working for Brent Law Centre, she became a legal officer for the National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL), a role in which she was found in contempt of court following action pursued by Michael Havers, a former Attorney General.

Harriet Ruth Harman was born at 108 Harley Street in London, and privately educated at St Paul's Girls' School.

[1] She is a daughter of John Bishop Harman, a Harley Street doctor,[2] and his wife Anna née Spicer, a barrister, who gave up practising when she had children and who was the Liberal Party candidate for Hertford in the 1964 general election.

In the subsequent by-election held on 28 October 1982, Harman was elected to succeed Lamborn with 11,349 votes (50.34%), a majority of 3,931 over Social Democratic candidate Dick Taverne, a former Labour MP for Lincoln.

During this time, her more notable policies included introducing a minimum income guarantee and winter fuel payments for the elderly.

It was later ruled that the fuel payments policy breached European sex discrimination laws in that men had to wait five years longer to receive them than women.

According to many in the media, this was the result of a series of public rows with junior minister Frank Field, though others also cited her decision to cut benefits to lone parents as a factor.

In accordance with convention, she was appointed as Queen's Counsel, although she had previously had no rights of audience in the higher courts, did not obtain them and never presented a case during her time as Solicitor General, or at all.

[22][23] While she supported the Iraq War, during the Deputy Leadership campaign, she said that she would not have done so had she known about the lack of concrete evidence of weapons of mass destruction.

[24][25] Harman did not have the support of any major unions, and helped to fund her campaign by taking out a personal loan of £10,000[26] and a £40,000 extension to her mortgage.

[29] Alan Johnson had led in all but the first of the previous rounds, but when second-preference votes had been redistributed after the fourth round, Harman as elected with 50.43% of the vote to Johnson's 49.56%[30] In November 2007, it emerged that property developer David Abrahams' secretary Janet Kidd had donated £5,000 to Harman's successful deputy leadership bid.

After an investigation by The Mail on Sunday newspaper into other donations made by people associated with Abrahams, and Prime Minister Gordon Brown's assertion that all such monies would be returned, Harman issued a statement saying she accepted the donation on 4 July "in good faith," had registered the monies with the Electoral Commission and the Register of Members' Interests, and that she "was not aware of any funding arrangements... between David Abrahams and Janet Kidd".

[33] On 1 April 2008 the Daily Mail reported that Harman had decided to wear a kevlar-reinforced stab vest while touring her Peckham constituency under police guard.

On 2 April The Guardian relayed information from the Metropolitan Police that "the type of Met Vest she wore over her jacket protected her from knife attacks and bullets, and, for her at least, was optional".

[34] Harman compared the decision to wearing a hard hat while touring a building site, which led the BBC's John Humphrys to respond, during an interview for BBC Radio 4, "You wear a hard hat on a building site because... there is the danger that something might drop on your head.

Scholar wrote: "It is the Statistics Authority's view that use of the 23% on its own, without qualification, risks giving a misleading quantification of the gender pay gap".

In November 2010, Harman's parliamentary private secretary Ian Lavery had blocked a motion designed to allow the repayments to be made public.

[47] Harman allegedly blocked a series of votes to liberalise Britain's abortion laws via the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill (now Act).

[52] It was reported that the Labour Government at the time asked MPs not to table these pro-choice amendments (and at least until Third Reading) and then allegedly used parliamentary mechanisms in order to prevent a vote accordingly.

The white paper also proposed measures to end age discrimination, promote transparency in organisations and introduce a new equality duty on the public sector.

"[55] Harman also commissioned a report on allowing political parties to draw up all-black shortlists[56] designed to increase the number of black MPs in Westminster.

[67] In March 2014, an article from the Daily Mail exposed that a 1979 letter from paedophile group supporter contained Ms Harman's initials.

The Guardian also states that in an NCCL briefing note dated 1978, Harman urged amendments to a 1978 Child Protection Bill declaring that "images of children should only be considered pornographic if it could be proven the subject suffered", which Harman says was an argument intended to protect from "unintended consequences" such as parents being prosecuted for taking pictures of their children on the beach or in the bath.

Motion 39 stated: This AGM reaffirms the right of free discussion and freedom to hold meetings for all organisations and individuals doing so within the law.

[83][84] Harman wrote to the Attorney General to complain about an unduly lenient sentence of a man whose partner died while engaging in erotic strangulation.

[85] Harman chaired the Privileges Committee of the House of Commons over the investigation into Boris Johnson's breach of lockdown rules during the COVID-19 pandemic, concerning four specific assertions made by the then Prime Minister Boris Johnson at Prime Minister's Questions about "the legality of activities in 10 Downing Street and the Cabinet Office under Covid regulations", events commonly referred to as Partygate.

[109] Harman was again caught breaking the speed limit the following April, this time in a 30 mph zone, receiving a further 3 points on her driving licence.

[113] Road safety organisation Brake criticised the leniency of the punishment and decision to drop the charge of driving whilst using a mobile phone.

[114] The judge defended the decision stating: "Ms Harman's guilty plea to driving without due care and attention included her admitting that she had been using a mobile phone at the time".