How Carrie Symonds can learn from Cherie Blair’s mistakes

The PM’s partner has one of the toughest jobs in politics even though it’s not a political appointment. That’s the nub of the difficulty. The role is undefined and unpaid. And whatever the partner does can be labelled a blunder and used to attack the prime minister. I’ve just written a play, ‘Cherie – My Struggle’, about Mrs Blair’s life inside Downing Street. Carrie Symonds is bound to face many of the difficulties Cherie had to grapple with. 

First, security. Cherie was shocked to learn that she couldn’t leave Number 10 without informing her close protection officers. They accompanied her everywhere, even to the chemist. She was banned from driving her own car. On one occasion she escaped out the back and vanished for a couple of hours but when she returned she discovered that her security team had been reprimanded. She never did it again.

Tiny details of her life held unexpected risks.