The only previously noted media star to come out of Whitley, near Warrington, was Colin Crompton, the chairman of The Wheeltappers and Shunters' Club ("Give order!" was his catchphrase).
Now we have Culture Secretary Michelle Donelan. She was a member of Sale and Altrincham West Conservative Party (base now for Sir Graham Brady MP) and, at 15, spoke at the 1999 Party Conference in Blackpool to resist more devolution.
She won an AS Level in Media Studies at sixth form college, and proceed to the University of York, where she got involved in student tv. Then followed a year in Australia, as a marketing assistant on Pacific Magazines, publishers of Marie Claire Australia in Sydney. She also made it to Melbourne...
End of an era @NeighboursTV! pic.twitter.com/eKLhYhwBGJ
— Michelle Donelan MP (@michelledonelan) July 29, 2022
Then it was back to the UK for a "partnership marketing assistant job" with The History Channel. This provided time for her to contest the safe Labour seat of Wentworth and Dearne in south Yorkshire.
After that disappointment she found herself publicising WWE in this country - the wrestling promoters run by CEO Linda McMahon, later to serve in the Trump administration. She nurtured Chippenham, and nicked it from the LibDems in 2015. She also found a partner, Tom Turner, now head of commercial for Swindon-based Stronghold ('not just another PPE company'). At the time he was with V12 Footwear in Chippenham; he comes from a large family of Plymouth Brethren members.
As an MP she's had donations from Sir Henry Keswick, Andrew Fenwick, a Domino's Pizza franchise firm and Simon Blagden (formerly of Fujitsu, now spookily running Building Digital UK.) She's also found time for study trips to Tokyo, Taipei, Sri Lanka and Dublin. She was the shortest serving Cabinet Minister on record, lasting 36 hours before deciding she couldn't continue to support Boris Johnson. She switched to Liz Truss after first backing Penny Mordaunt.
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