Margarita Beckett
... or how one of Britain’s most strait-laced politicians ended up shaken and stirred after night out with a champion athlete
FEW Cabinet Ministers have such a strait-laced image as former deputy Labour leader Margaret Beckett, whose only indulgence away from politics was thought to be caravan holidays with husband Leo.
Until now. For according to one of Britain’s top athletes, Mrs Beckett, 69, has a wilder way of letting her hair down – knocking back marga- rita cocktails and wine. In a rather unlikely political exposé, Chrissie Wellington, Britain’s world champion ‘Ironman’ triathlete and a former civil servant, claims she and Mrs Beckett got ‘very drunk’ during an official trip to America. Ms Wellington says in her memoir, Life Without Limits, that she ‘got to know Mrs Beckett quite well’ when she worked for her as a speech writer and international development adviser before becoming a full-time athlete.
She describes a trip the pair made to a Green Aid summit in New York in 2004, when Mrs Beckett was Environment Secretary in Tony Blair’s Labour Government.
‘I was called to her [Mrs Beckett’s] hotel room to brief her in person. Unfortunately my computer had just crashed, and I’d lost the document. I was absolutely terrified, and had to brief her from memory. But it all went really well, and we went out afterwards and got drunk on margaritas.
‘My dad had told me never to mix work and alcohol, especially around your superiors.
‘You had to pretend you were drinking, or at least drink some water as well. But these cocktails were just too good. So I ended up getting very drunk with Margaret Beckett. She drank more than me, mind you, but she can handle it. She loves a glass of wine. And a margarita.’
Asked about the revelations, Mrs Beckett said: ‘I can’t say that’s uncharacteristic. I’m a great believer in winding down. I probably had a bit to drink but I doubt if I got drunk.’
Ms Wellington, 35, does not say where the two downed the margaritas, a sweet and sour mixture of tequila with orange-flavoured liqueur and a twist of lime or lemon, served with salt on the rim of the glass.
But they would have been spoilt for choice in New York, where cocktail bars compete to serve the ‘best margarita in town’.
The drink is often referred to in Sex In The City – perhaps not the first TV show that springs to mind in relation to the schoolmarmish Mrs Beckett.
Nor was it the only time the Minister played the party girl with Ms Wellington. The athlete was invited to a bash in Mrs Beckett’s luxurious grace-and-favour apartment in Whitehall after performing well on another overseas trip with her to the Earth Summit in Johannesburg in 2002.
Mrs Beckett was so pleased she gave her a pay rise.
Despite having fun with Mrs Beckett, Ms Wellington left Whitehall later in 2004, reportedly because she was disillusioned with bureaucracy and ‘paper pushing’.
She became a full-time athlete in 2007 and is a four-times winner of the Ironman Triathlon World Championship – an eight-hour event comprising swimming, cycling and a marathon.