Flather served as a Councillor from 1976 to 1991; as Deputy Mayor and as Mayor for the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead; and as a Justice of the peace from 1971 to 1990. She became a life peer for the Conservative party on 11 June 1990 as Baroness Flather, of Windsor and Maidenhead in the Royal County of Berkshire. She was the first Asian woman to receive a peerage. In 1998 she resigned as the Conservative whip over the demotion of Viscount Cranborne for his actions to reduce the impact of the 1999 House of Lords Act. She rejoined the party in 1999, but left a second time in 2008, since when she has sat as a crossbencher.