Dr Shirley Hoyes

PRINCIPLED and combative, Dr Shirley Eileen Hoyes, who has died age 83, was an inveterate traveller and redoubtable critic of the controversial procedure which resulted in 121 children on Teesside being taken from their families and placed in care between February and July of 1987. Eventually all but 27 were returned to their families.
By The Newsroom
Published 23rd Apr 2011, 07:00 BST

Her refusal to bow to conventional wisdom did her career no good. It led to her taking early retirement, and in 1991 she settled in the Ilkley area, remaining there for the rest of her life.

Dr Hoyes kept copious notes of all her life’s events, but overlooked the occasion when she cooked lamb for her family in a brand new microwave oven. Not having read the instructions, she followed her customary procedure of giving it 20 minutes per pound, plus 20 minutes extra. The family have known it ever since as Lamb Chernobyl, that disaster having occurred a few months earlier.

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Born in Burgh-on-Bain, Lincolnshire, she spent most of her childhood years, along with her younger sister Auria, in the School house at Springthorpe, near Gainsborough, where their mother was School Head.

Shirley, an attractive, bright, vivacious teenager, wanted to follow her mother into a profession, and at a time when few places were available to women, studied medicine at Leeds University, qualifying in 1951.

After first working as a GP, she switched to public health and was appointed Assistant County Medical officer of Health for Lindsey, Lincolnshire.

Returning to Leeds as a post-graduate, she was awarded the Diploma in Psychological Medicine in 1968 and later became a member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists.

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In 1970 she was appointed as children’s psychiatrist to the Doncaster and Rotherham area health authority.

The local women’s club was the Soroptimists and she became an active member, finding herself in complete agreement with its ideals of integrity, dignity of service, and love of country, and enjoying the friendships it brought her. In 1987 she was elected President of the Soroptimist International of Rotherham.

She recruited travelling companions among the friends she made, her travels having begun in 1953 with a tour of northern Italy when she was 26 and she and new husband, farmer John Richardson were on honeymoon.

The marriage came to an end in 1979 but her travels continued.

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Dr Hoyes maintained a healthy scepticism of directives and political trends and was always up for a good argument.

In her professional life, early in public health and later working with challenging children and their families as a child psychiatrist, she read widely, was up to date and an innovator, applying modern methods in her practice.

She pushed at accepted boundaries for the benefit of her patients and challenged the routine if she felt it was wrong; unable to compromise, she expected change.

Her innovative ideas and disregard for conventional wisdom attracted criticism, and it was unfortunate that she had retired by the time other professional had caught up with her ideas.

She is survived by her daughter Sarah, son Robert and three grandchildren.

Related topics:TeessideGainsboroughLincolnshire