I know how Victoria Starmer feels. My family home became a target when my husband was an MP

Yahoo

20-05-2025

At first, I thought it was a book. I was standing in the hallway of our Cornwall house in 2020 and opened the slim Royal Mail package, assuming it was a copy of Johnny's memoir. When I realised I was holding a nappy in my hand, it took me a moment to process what was going on. Then the side of it flapped open and I saw it was filled with adult human excrement.
'It's s---,' I screamed to Johnny, who had his back to me. It took him a beat to understand that I was being literal. Quickly, he grabbed it, ran outside and dumped it on the lawn, and then called the police. Johnny was at this point a minister in Boris Johnson's government and while all mail going to his Westminster and Plymouth offices was scanned, we were left to our own devices at home.
The police were with us half an hour later and were really helpful – eventually tracing it back to a woman in Croydon and doing everything they could to keep us safe. But I was shaken afterwards: this was our house, the place where we were raising our children away from prying eyes, and my husband's very public job had intruded inside it.
Hence my sympathy for Victoria Starmer. We don't know each other but I can guess how she must be feeling after the horrific arson incident at their north London house. Knowing these people can invade a place you see as a sanctuary – somewhere you deliberately keep separate from the business of politics – makes you feel powerless and very unsafe. For me, it was as if someone had reached their arm into my kitchen and handed me the nappy themselves.
Mrs Starmer is a clever woman and she will have understood that a job like her husband's doesn't come without consequences, but when Johnny first told me he wanted to be an MP, I was very naive. I didn't realise that abuse would be part of the territory.
Johnny and I met aged seven at our primary school in Sussex. We both sang in the choir, but after moving to different secondary schools we didn't see each other again until we were invited to the same party in London in 2009. I was 29 and recognised Johnny – who was in the Army and had already completed two tours of Afghanistan – immediately. We were engaged quickly but because we decided to start a family soon afterwards, we ended up not getting married for another five years.
However, our small wedding was arguably not the most life-changing moment of 2014. That is reserved for when Johnny told me he wanted to stand as an MP. He came home having read a statistic that said more soldiers died from suicide than on the field – and he found this so shocking he decided he wanted to do something about it.
Johnny and I have always been a team and even though Plymouth, the seat he wanted to contest in the 2015 election, was heavily Labour at that point, we decided to give it a go. I had given up my career in the airline industry to have my children and was earning money doing a cleaning job, so I was happy to help him in any way I could. Together, we drove around the city in a van emblazoned with Johnny's face and knocked on about 28,000 doors; our middle daughter, who was a baby then, was usually strapped to one of our backs.
We were given a 1 per cent chance of winning, so on the night of the election we went for a curry to celebrate having given it our best shot. Then we got a call from the constituency office: the count was close and we were needed there immediately.
When he won by 1,000 votes, I felt such a sense of achievement. Plymouth Labour could not believe it – and nor, to be honest, could we. Johnny was handed an envelope saying: 'Well done, you're an MP', and the whips still had no idea who he was. Our life changed quickly.
Unlike the party, the press were interested in us from the get-go. Johnny shared an office with four other new MPs but they had to kick him out because he had so many interviews and it was disturbing them. I think it was to do with him being a soldier and, maybe, our young family.
Soon we were an open story for everyone. I agreed to interviews if it meant Plymouth would get recognised and not just be the place people mistook for Portsmouth. I figured that if it meant talking about what shower gel we use, so be it.
As for our children: unlike Vic Starmer, I didn't mind occasional pictures of them in the paper, but I didn't want their lives to be too disturbed. We lived on the other side of the Tamar Bridge to Plymouth and we made sure they went to a school that wasn't in the constituency.
My life, meanwhile, was completely intertwined with Johnny's job. I ran his office; it was all casework, diary stuff and admin. While I was there, they made a rule that no family members could work for MPs, but because I was in situ I was allowed to stay. I worked so hard: I deserved my salary, no matter what people online said.
As for the rest of it, I just adapted. We were often invited to events in Plymouth and in London – and quite a few where I was asked to speak too. I really enjoyed it. Mostly, people were supportive of how much Johnny and I worked together, but every now and then someone from the 'old guard' would make a comment: usually something about me wearing trousers rather than a skirt. I just ignored it.
I opened a Twitter (now X) account so I could say the things Johnny wasn't able to – I'm outspoken, but he never asked me to tone it down (and apparently the bigwigs at Conservative HQ loved reading it). I once called Liz Truss an imbecile and that caused a bit of a hoo-ha, but let's be honest – history has proved me right.
I came off Twitter the day someone threatened the children: this person said that if I took them out that weekend, they wouldn't be safe. I told the police and they acted immediately, but that was it for me. I would be happy killing Twitter trolls forever but not if it puts the girls at risk.
I don't miss that aspect of political life at all. When we joined in 2015, Parliament had a security detail for the higher echelons but much less support for everyone else. Over Brexit, when tensions were running incredibly high and Jo Cox was murdered, there was a general feeling of unease and, thankfully, security was ramped up. From then on, I went everywhere with a panic button in my pocket, and when I did Johnny's surgery on a Thursday I had a bodyguard with me.
As Johnny's job got busier – and particularly once he became a minister in 2019 – I had to pick up more and more of the domestic work. He was usually away Monday to Thursday, which is a long time when you have three small children. It was hard for him too: he was desperate not to miss too much of the girls' childhoods, but he had no choice. Luckily, we have very easy-going daughters – and our third child, Audrey, was born in lockdown, so Johnny was home a lot during her first year.
Still, being an MP is all-consuming. It's a massive honour and privilege to be chosen by your peers; what we didn't realise was how awful it would be navigating the system and trying to get policies through. British politics, essentially, doesn't work. To pitch one side against the other means the whole thing is built on hatred, division and bullying. And even if one side comes up with a good idea, the other has to criticise it, which means you are set up to fail.
Still, for 10 years, it was our normal life. The 2024 election was brutal: Plymouth Labour are a special breed and when it was announced that we had lost, the security detail walked us to the stage, we shook the hand of the winner, and were back in the car five minutes later.
Afterwards, there was an adjustment period and I felt sad for Johnny, who had put his heart and soul into it – but there was also a feeling of peace. It's wonderful having him home. Last December, he went to every Christmas concert and nativity play that the children were in for the first time in nearly a decade. I also finally had the space to think about what I wanted to do. I started The Dress Barn – a space to buy clothes for events and weddings in Cornwall, where we live. I love doing it.
As for politics: if Johnny ever went back, he wouldn't be messing about – he would go with a big role in mind and, of course, I'd support him. But for now, we're happy being out of the spotlight.
As told to Melissa Twigg
Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.