Cherie Blair

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cherie Blair
Born	September 23, 1954 (age 52) Bury, England, United Kingdom
Spouse	Tony Blair
Children	Euan, Nicky, Kathryn, Leo
Parents	Anthony Booth (father) Gale Smith (mother)

Cherie Blair (born 23 September 1954 in Bury, England), known professionally as Cherie Booth QC, is a prominent barrister. She is married to Tony Blair, the current British Prime Minister.

Contents 1 Life 2 Legal career 3 Controversies 4 Trivia 5 External links 6 References

[edit] Life

Her father, the actor Tony Booth, left her mother when Cherie was eight years old. Cherie and her sister, Lyndsey, were then raised by their mother Gale and their paternal grandmother Vera Booth, a devout Roman Catholic. Cherie and her sister both attended Catholic schools in Crosby in Merseyside. Cherie attended Seafield Convent Grammar which is now part of Sacred Heart Catholic College. Cherie has six half-sisters, including the journalist Lauren Booth.

She studied law at the London School of Economics and graduated with a First Class degree. She later came at the top of her year in the bar exams,^[1] while teaching law at the University of Westminster. In 1976, while she was studying to become a barrister, she met Tony Blair. She obtained a pupillage in the chambers of Derry Irvine ahead of him, although he was also taken on. Married on 29 March 1980, they have four children: Euan, Nicky, Kathryn and Leo.

Booth unsuccessfully contested the seat of North Thanet in Kent at the 1983 UK general election, losing to Roger Gale, while her husband was selected at the last minute for a safe seat in Sedgefield in County Durham in the same election.

[edit] Legal career

A member of Lincoln's Inn, she became a barrister in 1976 and Queen's Counsel in 1995. In 1999, she was appointed a Recorder (a permanent part-time judge) in the County Court and Crown Court. She was Chancellor of Liverpool John Moores University from 1999-2006, and on 26 July 2006 was awarded the honorary title of Emeritus Chancellor. She is also Governor of the London School of Economics and the Open University. She is a founding member of Matrix Chambers in London from which she continues to practise as a barrister. Matrix was formed in 2000 specialising in human rights law, though members also practise in a range of areas of UK public and private law, the law of the European Union and European Convention on Human Rights, and public international law^[2]

She specializes in employment, discrimination and public law and in this capacity has occasionally represented claimants taking cases against the UK government.^[3]

Cherie Blair has appeared in a number of leading cases. A notable example before the European Court of Justice was concerned with discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation. See, ECJ Case C-249/96, Lisa Jacqueline Grant vs. South-West Trains Ltd [1]

[edit] Controversies

The neutrality of this article is disputed. Please see the discussion on the talk page.

Cherie Blair has, over several years, found herself causing controversy which damaged not only her reputation but that of her husband the Prime Minister and the Labour Party. In this way, Cherie Blair has been compared to former U.S. First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton and former U.S. First Lady Nancy Reagan.

In 2002, Blair hit the newspaper headlines in the scandal referred to as "Cheriegate" because of her involvement with Peter Foster, a convicted Australian conman, who assisted her with the purchase of two flats in Bristol. Blair tried to distance herself from Foster and briefed the press office at Number 10 to go public with a statement claiming that Foster was not involved with the deal. She was caught out when Foster provided evidence that she had lied. She went public herself, tearfully reading a prepared statement blaming her "misfortune" on the pressures of running a family and being a mother. She tried to distance herself from Foster, but it was later revealed that she and Tony Blair had agreed to be godparents to the yet-to-be born child of Foster and his partner Carole Caplin (Caplin later miscarried).^[4]

Her relationship with Peter Foster's then-partner, the so-called "style guru" and former model Carole Caplin, has given rise to headlines in some newspapers. Caplin is credited with introducing Blair to various New Age symbols and beliefs, including "magic pendants" known as "BioElectric Shields".^[5] The most controversial of Blair's New Age practices occurred when on holiday in Mexico. She and her husband, wearing only bathing costumes, took part in a rebirthing procedure that involved smearing mud and fruit over each others' bodies while sitting in a steam bath.^[6] It is claimed her fourth pregnancy at 45 came after she submitted to New Age sexual techniques.^[7]

Later in 2002, she apologised after saying, in reference to the Palestinian suicide bombers, "As long as young people feel they have no hope but to blow themselves up, we're never going to make progress, are we?", within hours of a blast in Jerusalem that killed at least 19 people.^[8][9]

In 2003, after being invited to a Melbourne shopping centre and told to take a few items for free, she took 68 items. She subsequently paid £2,000 for the goods.^[10]

In 2005, while her husband was visiting President of the United States George Bush officially, she gave a private speech in Washington's Kennedy Centre where she was paid £30,000 for her appearance. She was criticised for leveraging government resources, Britain's ambassador and her husband's transport means to run private business.^[11]

In 2005, during a charity speaking tour of Australia, she was paid a £102,000 fee for after-dinner speaking, although the £82-a-head dinner raised £81,270, according to Consumer Affairs Victoria (CAV). £6,690, or 8%, of the total funds raised went towards cancer research.^[12]

Blair acted the case of Shabina Begum, a student at the mainly-Muslim Denbigh High School in Luton, who was refused permission to wear full head-to-toe jilbab, when the school uniform code only permitted students to wear the salwar kameez. For her client Blair claimed that it was about prejudice, however she was criticised for her involvement in the case when Begum was being supported by the controversial Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir, of which the girl's brother Shuweb Rahman was a member.^[13] But this criticism ignores the cab rank rule under which any English barrister is in general required to act for any client, if asked to do so.

Also in 2005, concern was highlighted by The Times, when Blair agreed to defend a UK couple, the Orams, who had been accused of illegally building a villa in the internationally unrecognised Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. President Tassos Papadopoulos of Cyprus referred to Blair's decision to represent the Orams as "a provocative action".^[14]

In winter 2005/6 she was allegedly involved in the re-allocation of British Army armoured vehicles on OP TELIC in Iraq, after a close friend complained that her husband was forced to patrol in a soft-skinned Landrover.

In 2006, the Labour Party paid a £7,700 bill for her personal hair stylist, Andre Suard, during the 2005 General Election campaign, a sum of £275 per day for the month leading up to the election. This angered some in the party, including former minister Peter Kilfoyle, who claimed the bill was twice what he had spent on his election campaign in the Liverpool Walton seat.^[15]

In 2006, Blair was granted an audience with the Pope. The Vatican convention is that females meeting the Pontiff should wear black, preferably with a black veil, or mantilla. By contrast, Blair chose to exercise the "white privilege", granted only to the wives of Catholic monarchs. Currently, these are Queen Sofía of Spain, Queen Paola of Belgium, Grand Duchess Maria of Luxembourg and Marie, Princess of Liechtenstein.^[16]

Blair is also thought to harbour contempt for the Royal Family. She pointedly refuses to curtsey when presented to the Queen, a behaviour said to amuse the Queen in private. Blair is also said to have called Princess Diana an "airhead," and referred to Princess Anne as a "bitch."^[7]

In May 2006, Blair was involved in the signing of copies of the Hutton Report to raise funds for the Labour Party. The Hutton Report was a controversial report by Lord Hutton into the death of Dr David Kelly, and whether the government had lied over the claims to Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. £400 was raised. Both she and her husband have refused to apologise.^[17]

In September 2006, it was reported that Blair had been investigated by the police over an incident at a school sports day where she, it was claimed, slapped a 17 year old boy who had asked to have his picture taken with her and then gestured behind her back. On investigation it was determined that she did not hit the boy and it was quickly announced that no further police action was planned.^[18]

Later in September 2006, in the febrile atmosphere surrounding the Labour Party conference in the leadership speculation following her husband's planned departure, she was allegedly heard by a Bloomberg journalist to comment on Gordon Brown's speech as a collection of "lies". She has denied this.

On 21 January 2007, another controversy arose, when it was revealed that she had told the Cabinet Secretary that it was her right, under the European Convention on Human Rights, to thousands of pounds' worth of cut-price designer clothes.^[19]

[edit] Trivia

• Cherie Blair is the first cousin four times removed of the American actor John Wilkes Booth who assassinated Abraham Lincoln.^[20][21]
• She commented in a recent interview for the Times magazine, "You may have noticed I like nice young men."
• She is well known for her "unfortunate" unphotogenic appearances in UK newspapers where the photo-journalists often capture unflattering shots, focusing in particular on her smile [2], [3]. This is often captured as an open-mouthed broad grimace and has led to her appearance being compared by some to a so-called "Wide Mouth Frog" or the Crazy Frog.
• In 2005, Bill Clinton urged her to stand as a Member of Parliament when her husband retires. He offered, "If she ever campaigned for office and wanted me to go ringing doorbells for her, I’d be happy to do it.".^[22]

• She is a close friend of English photographer Mary McCartney, daughter of former Beatle Sir Paul McCartney.

• She was a friend of Caroline Benn, the wife of former Labour MP Tony Benn until her death in 2000

Preceded by Norma Major

Spouse of Prime Minister of the United Kingdom 1997-

Incumbent

[edit] External links

The following links were last verified 14 December 2006.

• Matrix Chambers — Cherie Booth, QC
• First Lady of Downing Street speech

[edit] References