Catharine Ashton studied economics at Bedford College (now part of Royal Holloway, University of London) and earned a bachelor’s degree in sociology in 1977. Upon graduating, she worked as a secretary for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament before taking a job in management consultancy in 1979. From 1983 to 1989 Ashton was a director of Business in the Community, an organization that encouraged corporate responsibility and facilitated partnerships between the public and private sectors. She spent the 1990s working as a policy adviser, and in 1998 she was tapped to head the Hertfordshire health authority. The following year she was awarded a Labour life peerage by Prime Minister Tony Blair, and she entered the House of Lords as Baroness Ashton of Upholland, of St. Albans in the county of Hertfordshire.

Photo and bio source : https://www.britannica.com/biography/Catherine-Ashton-Baroness-Ashton-of-Upholland