On 14 May 2010, Baroness Hanham was appointed Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department for Communities and Local Government.
Baroness Hanham is a Conservative member of the House of Lords, and was leader of Kensington and Chelsea Council from 1989-2000.

She was made a Life Peer as Baroness Hanham, of Kensington in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, in 1999. In the Lords, she has held the various positions of Shadow Minister for Local Government, the Home Office and Transport. She was also Chairman of St Mary's Hospital NHS Trust from 2000-2007. She became a Freeman of the City of London in 1984, and was awarded a CBE in 1997.

Baroness Hanham has a number of voluntary interests, and is the president or patron of six volunteering and charitable organisations in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. She is a former Chairman of the English Volunteering Development Council, and most recently was the President of Volunteering England.