Ann Widdecombe - Personal Life and Family

Personal Life and Family

Until her retirement at the 2010 general election, Widdecombe divided her time between her two homes – one in London and one in the village of Sutton Valence, Kent, in her constituency. She sold both of these properties, however, upon deciding to retire at the next general election. She shared her home in London with her widowed mother, Rita Widdecombe, until Rita's death, on 1 May 2007, aged 95. In March 2008, she purchased a house in Haytor, on Dartmoor in Devon, to where she has now retired. Her brother, Malcolm (1937–2010), who was an Anglican Canon in Bristol, retired in May 2009 and died of metastatic oesophageal cancer on 12 October 2010. Her nephew, Rev Roger Widdecombe, is an Anglican priest.

She has never married nor had any children. In November 2007 on BBC Radio 4 she described how a journalist once produced a profile on her with the assumption that she had had at least "one sexual relationship", to which Widdecombe replied: "Be careful, that's the way you get sued". When interviewer Jenni Murray asked if she had ever had a sexual relationship, Widdecombe laughed "it's nobody else's business". Widdecombe has a fondness for cats and has a section of her website devoted to all the pet cats with which she has shared her life.

In a recent interview, Widdecombe talked about her appreciation of music despite describing herself as "pretty well tone-deaf".