Spicy past of a political paramour
EXCLUSIVE: The inside story of the SNP’s love-cheat MPs and the blonde they bedded
MAKING a name for oneself is rarely a straightforward matter in the cut-throat world of political journalism.
Take Serena Cowdy. Until this week, the Oxford-educated actressturned-writer, who trots out stories for the House of Commons magazine, had barely been heard of even at Westminster.
But when it comes to raising your profile, there’s nothing like an affair with a married MP to get tongues wagging. And if you really want to get yourself talked about, then two affairs – with two married MPs – is even better.
So it was that, overnight, 36-year-old Miss Cowdy transformed herself from virtual unknown to SNP paramour extraordinaire.
This week, she burst into the political limelight with all the subtlety of a flaming haggis at a Burns Supper; leaving SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon with something of a headache as she began sweeping up the debris left behind by two wrecked political marriages within her usually close-knit party.
First to cast off his wedding ring was Western Isles MP Angus MacNeil, a 45year-old father-of-three who announced his separation from wife Jane – who is also his parliamentary assistant – last year, not long after the end of his affair with Miss Cowdy.
This week, it was the turn of 53-yearold Dundee East MP Stewart Hosie, who is also deputy leader of the SNP. He announced he had separated from his wife, Holyrood Health Secretary Shona Robison, ending one of the most powerful partnerships in Scottish politics. Miss Robison was photographed being comforted by Miss Sturgeon, a close friend. Complicated? You bet.
Miss Cowdy may have told friends she saw Nationalist MPs as romantic revolutionaries, ‘the Mujahideen of British politicians’. But this English rose is currently a very large thorn in the side of the party she claims to admire so much.
While Mr MacNeil now faces a Parliamentary grilling by the standards commissioner over claims he spent taxpayers’ money on upmarket hotels where they enjoyed trysts, Miss Cowdy has allegedly told friends her relationship with Mr Hosie is ‘serious’ and that she is ‘madly in love’.
Only a fortnight ago, in her rather revealing online blog Cowdy Calling, she tweeted a picture of a diaphanous wedding dress with the caption: ‘Ohhhhhh. I thought I didn’t want to get married but actually now I do just so I can wear a dress like this.’
Whether or not father-of-one Mr Hosie is quite so keen to don his kilt and head back down the aisle remains to be seen.
So where has Miss Cowdy, who claims to be ‘a bona fide nut magnet’ and says those who are drunk or ‘misfire socially’ tend to gravitate towards her, sprung from? Her hotchpotch CV may not provide many clues. But on examining her family tree, one thing is crystal clear; she follows in the footsteps of an extraordinary line of equally feisty – and equally outspoken – women.
Her grandmother, mother-of-seven Faith King, is an actress and cabaret showgirl turned novelist who once appeared in Dad’s Army and will turn 100 later this year.
In her autobiography published six years ago, Mrs King claimed to be the illegitimate daughter of Sir Walter Lawrence, High Sheriff of Hertfordshire. The book’s publicity promoted her as ‘a spoiled brat living on the fringe of the Roaring 20s, the b ***** d child of a self-made tycoon and an Edwardian beauty’.
According to her Belgian grandmother Anna, Miss Cowdy’s greatgreat grandmother: ‘We are descended from the Royal House of France and entitled to use plates of gold embossed with the fleur de lys.’
Among her reminiscences in Today Not Tomorrow, Mrs King told how she had to be kept secret from her father’s legitimate family: ‘I was the skeleton rattling in the wardrobe. Today the paparazzi would have a field day.’
Mrs King, who now lives in Attleborough, Norfolk, worked at the Cabaret Club in Soho, where she was paid to flirt with men and ‘encourage them to order champers and spirits’.
Later, she became a showgirl for a travelling revue, touring Northern theatres where she learnt to ‘grind my hips and dance with a large pink ostrich feather fan’.
This week, she said: ‘I know all about
‘A bona fide nut magnet’
my grand-daughter, but I have been told not to give an interview.’
But she seemed unfazed over Miss Cowdy’s antics, smiling as she said: ‘I used to be in the theatre myself, you know.’
A love of theatrics may have also been passed on to Miss Cowdy by her father – although Vernon Cowdy had given up his acting career by the time his only child was born. He was then the manager of an antiques centre and family life was not easy.
His marriage to Miss Cowdy’s mother Frances broke down when she was seven or eight and father and daughter moved to a tiny flat in London.
Mrs Cowdy, a secretary who became a European buyer for a Japanese cosmetics company, married a Japanese air conditioning engineer and moved to Japan, where she still lives.
The now Mrs Nakako, 66, was said to have been ‘in floods of tears’ this week on hearing of her daughter’s plight.
Mr Cowdy, 73, declined to comment about his daughter’s affairs, aside from saying: ‘Sounds great.’
So who is Serena Cowdy? Born in Peterborough in 1980, she has described her childhood as modest but happy.
Writing on her website she recalled: ‘When I was growing up it was just me and my dad and we lived in a tiny bedsit in Central London. I loved animals but we didn’t have room for a pet and we couldn’t afford to go to London Zoo.
‘So instead, my dad took me on “urban safaris”, introducing me to all the wildlife that was right on our doorstep. I fed the sparrows on the window ledge, made friends with the squirrels in the park and
spotted enormous stag beetles pottering along the pavements.’
A clever girl, she gained a place to read modern history at St Hilda’s College, Oxford in 1998, then the university’s last all-female college and often unkindly referred to as ‘the Virgin Megastore’.
It was the subject of a Channel 4 documentary during Miss Cowdy’s undergraduate years. The five-part series called College Girls was screened in 2002 and described St Hilda’s as ‘a doorway to women seeking wisdom and understanding’ and ‘a launching pad to power and glory’.
But Oxford life for Miss Cowdy appears to have been a little less highbrow.
On her blog, she recalled one occasion when she shared a lift with ‘a very nice elderly chap’ and found herself pouring her heart out about her ‘latest boyfriend disaster’. After saying goodbye, she bumped into him moments later. It was Garret Fitzgerald, ex-Taoiseach of Ireland and guest of honour at the History Society dinner she was attending.
After Oxford she enrolled at the Central School of Speech and Drama – but her acting career doesn’t appear to have taken off.
A couple of years ago she appeared in Eve’s Demons, playing a librarian in a low-budget British psychological thriller about a girl becoming entangled with the wrong sort of older men.
A publicity poster for the film featured an image of an alluring yet sinister woman and the slogan: ‘Dreams can come true. But so can nightmares.’
The wives of Angus MacNeil and Stewart Hosie would surely agree.
Before turning to political journalism, Miss Cowdy had worked as an actress, a wildlife campaigner, a National Trust social media assistant and a self-styled animal welfare expert with a penchant for badgers.
Describing herself as ‘a friend of all creatures’, one of the centres which benefited from her services was the Brent Lodge Bird and Wildlife Centre in Sidlesham near Chichester in West Sussex, which counts BBC TV presenter Chris Packham and Alan Titchmarsh as patrons.
Staff there told the Mail this week that, although Miss Cowdy had no formal training and no zoology or veterinary qualifications, she threw herself into volunteer work.
She also managed to persuade the centre, which has been in existence for 44 years, to bestow the title of vice-president upon her and proudly announced it on Twitter. At an open day in 2014, at which she turned up with her then boyfriend in tow, she even suggested posing for professional photographs with some of the injured badger cubs. She bravely invited the sometimes ferocious beasts onto her lap for a cuddle – something a spokesman at the centre said it would not usually advise.
Darren Ashcroft, who has worked at the centre for 25 years, said: ‘No one really knew what she did but she always turned out on the open days when we attract quite a few people.
‘What she lacked in training she made up for with enthusiasm. She was passionate about the animals and would help out at feeding time. We have all sorts of animals and birds; everything from deer, foxes and badgers to sparrows, hedgehogs and ducks – and she wanted to be involved with all of them. We only have three members of staff and around ten volunteers, so her help was very much welcomed.’
He added: ‘She said she was a friend of all creatures but what she really liked was the badgers. She loved her badgers. Serena was very much against the culling and she was very passionate about it. She definitely disagreed with it.’
Sadly, it seems Miss Cowdy’s recent shenanigans have taken up much of her time. Mr Ashcroft said: ‘We haven’t seen her down here for a little bit. I know she tried to launch herself as a wildlife expert on TV but it has been a while since she visited.’
Mis Cowdy’s foray into political journalism, she admits, came quite by chance, after her interest in wildlife lead her to attend a Houses of Parliament meeting in 2014. She became lost in the myriad corridors and in her blog described how she was tottering around on heels, trying to find her way around, before being rescued by a Tory MP.
‘This, ladies and gents, is when my hero arrived – in the unlikely form
‘Office affairs and dumping etiquette’
of a staunchly Right-wing Conservative MP. I won’t name him (unless he wants me to – in which case I shall name him like mad) but suffice to say he saved my life.
‘He appeared from nowhere – practically on a steed – and asked if I needed help (I did). I then compounded the impression of my general incompetence by saying I didn’t have a clue who he was.’
She goes on to recall how he was ‘wonderfully gallant’ as he led her to the bar she was trying to reach.
‘On the way he also managed to win a verbal duel with another journalist, dodge Lord Prescott and find out that margaritas are my very favourite cocktail.’
Miss Cowdy then decided to become a political journalist. On her blog page, she claims to be ‘making politics human’, a task she clearly takes very seriously indeed.
But she appeared to be less defiant about her own behaviour this week, lying low and only emerging briefly from her flat in South London on Wednesday, looking somewhat pale and tired.
What an extraordinary week it has been for this young woman. Having thrust herself enthusiastically into the world of political journalism, she must now be questioning the wisdom of allowing herself to become the subject of the story.
Then again, she could always take heart with some of her own homespun widsom. Of the many articles to be found on her blog, those on ‘office affairs’ and ‘dumping etiquette’ should make for pertinent reading.