Nick Clegg's wife rules out role in Lib Dem election campaign

Published on Sunday 21 March 2010 21:56

THE wife of Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg has ruled out playing a prominent role in his general election campaign.

Miriam Gonzalez Durantez said she was "willing to help" the Lib Dems, but that working as an international lawyer and her duties as a mother of three accounted for most of her time.

Gordon Brown and David Cameron have both indicated that their spouses will be employed as vote-winning weapons as they attempt to present a more personal image to the electorate.

In an ITV television interview last night, Mrs Clegg and her husband spoke about falling in love and choosing names for their sons.

But Mrs Gonzalez Durantez said she would not push forward any "sugar-coated image" of herself.

Objecting to the description of her as a "political wife", she insisted: "I'm the wife of a politician. I don't have a role, I'm just married to him."

Asked if she would join the campaign trail along with Sarah Brown and Samantha Cameron, she said: "I am willing of course to help Nick, because he is my husband.

"I want the best for him and of course I love him. I'm willing to help the party because I'm willing to help what I defend. There is a core set of principles that I just cannot wait to see implemented in the country.

"(But] how am I going to do that while I have children and I have a busy job? I don't have the luxury of having a job that I can simply abandon for five weeks, and I imagine that that is the situation for most people in the country."

What the other wives did was a "personal choice", she said, insisting it should be possible to maintain a normal domestic life despite increased media attention.

"But it's one thing to let people to look into your life so that they get to know the politician, the person, and a different thing, in my view, is to put together a sugar-coated image of yourself, in the hope that that brings you votes."