She was shown in soft focus in a Party political broadcast teaching her son the way to stroke a rabbit, an appearance which was heavily ridiculed[by whom?].
Following the election, with the SDP split over whether to merge with the Liberal Party, Barnes strongly supported David Owen in his resistance to merger.
[citation needed] Rosie Barnes became a member of Dr Owen's 'continuing' SDP, but when the party was disbanded in 1990 she continued to sit in Parliament as an 'Independent Social Democrat'.
After leaving politics Barnes became a charity director, first for the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists at Birthright (which she renamed WellBeing), and subsequently as Chief Executive of the Cystic Fibrosis Trust which she joined in October 1996 and from which she retired in August 2010.
[citation needed][4] In 2011 she accepted an invitation to become Patron of Child Health International, a charity dedicated to helping families affected by cystic fibrosis in former Soviet bloc countries.