 She competed with three men to secure the position, which was vacated due to the resignation of the previous MP, George Buchanan who assumed the position of Chairman of the National Assistance Board.She held the seat at subsequent general elections, until her death in 1969 at the age of 78.She was MP for Glasgow Gorbals at the time of "The Gorbals Vampire" incident in September 1954 when hundreds of schoolchildren went searching the Southern Necropolis cemetery armed with stakes to find a vampire with iron teeth.