| Catherine Ashton | |
|---|---|
| High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy | |
| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office 1 December 2009 |
|
| Preceded by | Javier Solana (High Representative for CFSP) Benita Ferrero-Waldner (Commissioner for External Relations) |
| First Vice President of the European Commission | |
| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office 9 February 2010 |
|
| President | José Manuel Barroso |
| Preceded by | Margot Wallström |
| European Commissioner for Trade | |
| In office 3 October 2008 – 1 December 2009 |
|
| President | José Manuel Barroso |
| Preceded by | Peter Mandelson |
| Succeeded by | Benita Ferrero-Waldner |
| Leader of the House of Lords Lord President of the Council |
|
| In office 27 June 2007 – 3 October 2008 |
|
| Prime Minister | Gordon Brown |
| Preceded by | The Baroness Amos |
| Succeeded by | The Baroness Royall of Blaisdon |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 20 March 1956 Upholland, United Kingdom |
| Political party | Labour |
| Spouse(s) | Peter Kellner (1988–present) |
| Residence | St Albans, United Kingdom |
| Alma mater | Bedford College |
Catherine Ashton, Baroness Ashton of Upholland, (born 20 March 1956), is a British Labour politician who in 2009 became the European Union's High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. Under the Lisbon Treaty this post is combined with the post of Vice-President of the European Commission.
Her political career began in 1999 when she was created a Life Peer (Baroness Ashton of Upholland) by the Labour Government under which she took on a ministerial position (Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State) in the Department for Education and Skills in 2001, and subsequently in the Department for Constitutional Affairs and Ministry of Justice. She became a Privy Councillor PC in May 2006.
Catherine Ashton was appointed Leader of the House of Lords and Lord President of the Queen's Privy Council in Gordon Brown’s first Cabinet in June 2007. As well as Leader of the Lords, she held responsibility in the House of Lords for equalities issues. She also steered the Lisbon Treaty through the UK's upper chamber.
In 2008, she succeeded Peter Mandelson as Commissioner for Trade in the European Commission. In December 2009 she became the first person to take on the newly enlarged High Representative role for the EU as created by the Treaty of Lisbon.[1]
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Catherine Ashton was born in Upholland, Lancashire on 20 March 1956.[2][3] She comes from a working class family, with a background in coal mining going back generations.[4][5] She attended Upholland Grammar School in Billinge Higher End, Lancashire, then Wigan Mining and Technical College in Wigan.[6] Ashton graduated with a BSc in Sociology in 1977 from Bedford College, London (now part of Royal Holloway, University of London). She was the first person in her family to attend University.[7][8][9][5][4]
Between 1977 and 1983 Ashton worked for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) as an administrator and in 1982 was elected as its national treasurer and subsequently as one of its vice-chairs. From 1979 to 1981 she was Business Manager of The Coverdale Organisation, a management consultancy.[10][11] As of 1983 she worked for the Central Council for Education and Training in Social Work.[12] From 1983 to 1989 she was Director of Business in the Community working with business to tackle inequality, and established the Employers' Forum on Disability, Opportunity Now, and the Windsor Fellowship. For most of the 1990s, she worked as a freelance policy adviser.[8][13] She chaired the Health Authority in Hertfordshire from 1998 to 2001, and her children's school governing body, and became a Vice President of the National Council for One Parent Families.
She was made a Labour life peer as Baroness Ashton of Upholland in 1999, at the advice of Tony Blair. In June 2001 she was appointed Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State in the Department for Education and Skills. In 2002 she was appointed minister for Sure Start in the same department. In September 2004, she was appointed Parliamentary Under-Secretary in the Department for Constitutional Affairs, with responsibilities including the National Archives and the Public Guardianship Office. Ashton was sworn of the Privy Council in 2006, and became Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the new Ministry of Justice in May 2007.
In 2005 she was voted "Minister of the Year" by The House Magazine and "Peer of the Year" by Channel 4. In 2006 she won the "Politician of the Year" award at the annual Stonewall Awards, awarded to those that have made a positive impact on the lives of British LGBT people.[14]
On 28 June 2007 the new Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, appointed her to the Cabinet as Leader of the House of Lords and Lord President of the Council.[15] As Leader of the House, she was responsible for passing the Lisbon Treaty through the House of Lords.[16]
On 3 October 2008, she was nominated to replace Peter Mandelson as the UK's European Commissioner in Brussels. European Commissioners may not engage in any other occupation during their term of office, whether gainful or not[17] so, in order to take up her position, she used the procedural device previously used in 1984 by Lord Cockfield[18] and took a leave of absence from the House of Lords on 14 October 2008,[19] retaining her peerage but not her seat.[20]
Her appointment as Trade Commissioner was scrutinised by the European Parliament. She was criticised by Daniel Hannan, a British Conservative MEP, saying that she had "no background in trade issues at a time when the EU is engaged in critical negotiations with Canada, Korea and the WTO".[21] However, following her public confirmation hearing by the Trade Committee of the European Parliament, Ashton was approved by the Parliament on 22 October 2008 with 538 to 40 votes, and 63 abstentions.[22] She has since finished negotiations on the Free Trade Agreement with Korea and initialled it in October 2009.[23]
On 19 November 2009, Ashton was appointed the EU's first High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, a post that was combined with Vice-President of the European Commission. She was elected by the Heads of State and Government of the 27 European Union countries at a summit in Brussels.
Besides representing the EU at international forums and co-ordinating the Common Foreign and Security Policy and the Common Security and Defence Policy, the High Representative also:
• As Vice-President of the European Commission, she participates in the weekly meeting of the European Commission.
• Participates in the meetings of the European Council, where all EU leaders meet.
• Is head of the European External Action Service
• Responsible for the European Union Special Representatives
• President of the Foreign Affairs Council
• President of the European Defence Agency
• Chair of the board of the European Union Institute for Security Studies
During her term in office she and her team have given priority to a number of European and global issues. These include:
• Participation in the Quartet negotiations on the Middle East Peace Process
• Leading European negotiations with Iran over its controversial Nuclear programme
• Responding to the Arab Spring with a new European Neighbourhood Policy (May 2011), to provide funding and market access to North Africa
• Supporting democratic forces in Libya by opening an EU office in Benghazi in May 2011 and supporting the National Transitional Council
• Building a European consensus to establish sanctions against the Assad regime in Syria
• Strengthening relations with the EU’s Strategic Partners such as the US, Russia, China, Brazil, India and South Africa
• In the Balkans, forging renewed talks between Serbs and Kosovars (“Belgrade-Pristina" dialogue)
• Negotiating an upgraded status for the EU at the UN as foreseen under the Lisbon Treaty
• Establishing the European External Action Service (1st December 2010), which merged the external relations departments of the European Commission, Council of the European Union, and will have diplomats seconded from national foreign services.
In addition Ashton has personally embraced women’s rights and has visited an orphanage on the Gaza strip several times as part of this. In September 2011 she took part in the UN’s “Women in Political Participation” event in New York.
Ashton spends a large part of her time on the Middle East and North Africa. She has received praise for her role in the Middle East Peace Process, where she finds herself at the heart of mediation .[24]. In relation to Libya, Ashton is optimistic about the possibility of the creation of what she calls "deep democracy", meaning an independent judiciary and civil service, respect for human rights, and the right of the people to vote the government out of office [25]. Ashton has called for the resignation of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, saying that the EU will not accept the chaos, destruction and death in response to democratic protests in the country [26].
She lives in London with her husband, Peter Kellner, the President of online polling organisation, YouGov.[27] She has two children, and three stepchildren.
She was awarded an Honorary Degree from the University of East London in 2005.[28]
Besides her mother tongue English, Ashton has some knowledge of French[29] but was not fluent in any foreign language at the time of her inauguration.
Ashton's relative obscurity caused considerable comment in the media with The Guardian newspaper reporting that her appointment as High Representative had received a 'cautious welcome as EU foreign minister from international relations experts'.[30] The Economist described her as being a virtual unknown with paltry political experience, having no foreign-policy background and having never been elected to anything. The magazine did however credit her with having piloted the Lisbon Treaty through the House of Lords, having handled the European Commission's trade portfolio without falling out with her colleagues, and being suited to consensus-building.[31]
Shami Chakrabarti, the director of a pressure group called Liberty, who became friends with Ashton when she was a minister at the Department of Constitutional Affairs, said her critics were wrong: "People underestimate Cathy at their peril. She is not a great big bruiser. She is a persuader and a charmer. That is the secret of her success."[32] Her friend, Ian McCartney, MP, said on her appointment: "She is a Wigan girl who has really made good... She is supportive of working people and has never forgotten her roots."[33] The morning after her appointment, Ashton told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "Over the next few months and years I aim to show that I am the best person for the job. I hope that my particular set of skills will show that in the end I am the best choice."[3]
She drew criticism, for the fact that she cannot speak any foreign languages.Britain’s High Representative is letting Europe down badly. Lady Ashton does not cut la moutarde.
Ashton has been angered by the criticism, which, according to aides, she argues is a result of the "latent sexism" within the EU community. Ashton came under further criticism, including explicit criticism from national defence ministers Hervé Morin, Carme Chacón, Jack de Vries, and EU minister Pierre Lellouche, for her failure to attend the European Defence Summit in Majorca.[34]
Secretary General Pierre Vimont joined those defending Ashton from criticism; praising her work in opening the EEAS office in Benghazi, Libya as making the EEAs very popular in Libya. He also supported her over Syria and has asked her to stand for a second term. Polish Minister for Europe, Mikolaj Dowgielewicz, also stated criticism against Ashton was "a lot of hot air" and that "she has an impossible job to do and she is doing it well. At the end of her time in office, people will be more positive about what she has done. She will leave a real legacy."[35]
Ashton faced questions in the European Parliament over her role as national treasurer in the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in the 1980s, amid claims by its opponents that it may have had financial links to the Soviet Union. The eurosceptic United Kingdom Independence Party has written to Jose Manuel Barroso, the European Commission President, asking him to investigate whether Ashton was party to payments that he alleged were made to CND from the Soviet regime in Moscow. Ashton’s office refused to discuss CND’s funding in detail. It merely said that she “left CND in 1983 and had no involvement after that”.
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by The Baroness Amos |
Leader of the House of Lords 2007–2008 |
Succeeded by The Baroness Royall of Blaisdon |
| Lord President of the Council 2007–2008 |
||
| Preceded by Peter Mandelson |
European Commissioner for Trade 2008–2009 |
Succeeded by Benita Ferrero-Waldner |
| European Commissioner from the United Kingdom 2008–present |
Incumbent | |
| Preceded by Javier Solana as High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy |
High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy 2009–present |
|
| Preceded by Benita Ferrero-Waldner as European Commissioner for External Relations and European Neighbourhood Policy |
||
| Preceded by Margot Wallström |
First Vice President of the European Commission 2010–present |
|
| Party political offices | ||
| Preceded by The Baroness Amos |
Leader of the Labour Party in the House of Lords 2007–2008 |
Succeeded by The Baroness Royall of Blaisdon |
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