On the day of his nomination as British Prime Minister, Hugh O’Leary, the husband of Liz Truss, hitherto virtually unknown to the general public, also made his public debut. Much like Denis Thatcher, Margaret’s husband, had once described himself as the “darkest husband of all time,” O’Leary seems to carve out the same stealth niche.
A graduate of the London School of Economics, O’Leary is practically unknown to the general public: it is known however that, in the early years of her marriage, when Truss was still a young party activist, she had a relationship that went on for 18 months with a Conservative congressman, Mark Field, on whose staff she had been assigned to the ranks. Field’s marriage fell apart, not Truss’s, who in fact later reported that the couple came out stronger. O’Leary appeared briefly at the Downing Street gate to greet the crowd of reporters after the new premier’s brief inauguration speech. His two daughters, Florence (16) and Liberty (13), will also arrive at the premier’s residence in the heart of London. It seems that the two girls are very excited at the prospect of living in one of the most famous addresses in the world (realistically at 11 Downing Street, where every prime minister has lived since 1997 because his lodgings are bigger). No teenagers have been seen in the residence since the Blair days. Apparently the two girls are already planning ‘sleepovers’ and staying on the vast country estate of Checkers, where there is also a heated swimming pool.
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Downing Street is a strange facility for the prime minister’s family, who live in close proximity to an office frequented by politicians and senior government officials at all hours of the day. Each prime minister independently decides which private area is reserved for the family. David Cameron, for example, said that for his children there was no distinction, “the work areas were theirs too: it was like a gigantic labyrinth to explore.”