ACTRESS Miranda Richardson has spoken of her admiration for former Blackburn MP Barbara Castle.

Mrs Castle, who represented the town in Parliament for 34 years, plays a key part in Made In Dagenham, the story of how 187 striking women at a Ford factory in 1968 paved the way for equal pay between the sexes.

Mrs Castle, who was employment minister at the time, defied all previous protocol to meet the women and was later instrumental in legislation which forbade sexual discrimination.

In the film she is played by Miranda Richardson – best known for the role of Queenie in 80s comedy, Blackadder She said: “I fancied playing Barbara; she is given some very good lines in the film.

“There is humour, and she is righteously angry when she needs to be and she’s very resilient and has completely ingrained herself in the public consciousness.

“She was such a hard grafter and was passionate about what she did, and how she felt, and about life in general.

“I saw a documentary on her later life, when her star was perhaps on the way down, but even so she just never stopped. She was always out there campaigning and helping and was curious. It was fantastic energy.”

For director Nigel Cole, whose previous work includes Calendar Girls, the role of Barbara Castle was crucial to the film.

He said: “Barbara was a woman in the heart of a man’s world, the only senior politician of her time.

“She came within a whisker of becoming Britain’s first female Prime Minister.

“We needed an actress with that sort of charisma and weight and could handle the humour of it.

"For the balance between the two you can’t get better than Miranda.

“The whole film builds to the women going to meet her.”

He, like Richardson, has read Castle’s diaries, and he found them ‘extensive and fascinating’.

He said he want the portrayal to be ‘sexy’ and show off her red hair, which was a ‘weapon she was only too happy to use’.

Made In Dagenham is released in cinemas on Friday, October 1.