Just who are the most powerful women in Britain today? Imogen O' Rorke profiles the women who are leading the way.
The Spectator recently called her ‘the new iron lady of Number 10’. The right wing magazine was referring to Cherie Blair’s – or rather, Cherie Booth QC’s – decision to speak out in defence of the New Human Rights act last summer. The Tories immediately rounded, calling her ‘an unaccountable cross between a first lady and a Lady Macbeth figure’, echoing the Republican hue and cry against Hillary Clinton.
Their main concern was that Cherie’s new law firm, Matrix, which specialises in human rights, stood to profit enormously from the cases the act provokes, possibly doubling her £250,000 salary. Both women, Hillary and Cherie in turn, have found out what happens to first ladies whenever they try to push their own political or private agendas – they come up against the weight of the establishment.
Cherie Booth has never concealed her ambitions. She jokes that she suffers from the Allerednic syndrome (Cinderella in reverse) – when a capable woman is condemned to a life of drudgery through marriage – and yet she does not appear to have sacrificed much in her successful 23 year legal career. When Cherie married Tony (they were both young lawyers and prominent members of the local labour branch) she made a decision to concentrate on law, and a family.
Educated at a convent grammar school, Cherie took the top first in her year in Law at LSE and also came top in her bar finals. She was Derry Irvine’s (now Lord Chancellor) first choice pupil and went on to specialise in employment law and judicial review, becoming one of the youngest QCs of her generation. Clearly, the prize of first female Lord Chancellor is within her grasp now.
