Philippa Roe, Baroness Couttie

The Right Honourable
The Baroness Couttie
Leader of Westminster City Council
Assumed office
4 March 2012
Preceded by Colin Barrow
Succeeded by Nickie Aiken
Member of the House of Lords
Lord Temporal
Assumed office
5 September 2016
Life Peerage
Personal details
Born Philippa Marion Roe
(1962-09-25) 25 September 1962
Hampstead, London, England
Nationality British
Political party Conservative
Spouse(s) John Ricketts, Stephen Couttie
Children 2
Alma mater University of St Andrews (MA)
Profession Investment banker

Philippa Marion Roe, Baroness Couttie (born 25 September 1962) is a British Conservative politician, who served as Leader of Westminster City Council from 2012 to 2017. Before entering public life she was an investment banker and a director of the financial services company Citigroup.

Life

Born in Hampstead and educated at the University of St Andrews, Roe was a director of Citigroup before entering politics in 2006.[1] She is a daughter of James Roe and Dame Marion Roe. She has one younger sister and one younger brother.[2] In 1982, she became the first student in 572 years to be elected to the University of St Andrews Senate, the institution's governing body. After leaving the university she began her career in the public relations industry, joining Burson Marsteller.

In the 1990s she served on a panel of experts from the private sector consulted by the Conservative government in establishing the private finance initiative,[3] and in 2004 she was the joint author of a report called "Reforming the Private Finance Initiative" published by the Centre for Policy Studies.[4]

Married to Stephen Couttie, a fund manager, she gave up her job at Citigroup when she became the mother of twins, Genevieve and Angus, and was elected to Westminster City Council soon afterwards, in 2006.[5] At that time she had recently recovered from cancer.[5][6]

She was appointed as a governor of Imperial College London[1] and in 2008 became the member of Westminster's cabinet for Housing. In June 2010 she stated her support for the new coalition government's decision to cap housing benefit at £400 a week.[7] In 2011 she took on the cabinet portfolio for Strategic Finance. The next year she succeeded Colin Barrow as Leader of the council, beating Edward Argar for the nomination,[8] and quickly distanced herself from a comparison with a predecessor, Dame Shirley Porter.[9] The same year, she took over the role of chairman of the statutory Health and Wellbeing Board for Westminster.[10] She also sits on the London Enterprise Panel.[11] In 2013 she was quoted as saying that "local people know best"[12] and that "The funding challenge is an opportunity to break free of orthodoxy and review all the services provided and how they can be delivered more efficiently."[13]

In 2014 she was re-elected in the three-member Knightsbridge and Belgravia ward, where she topped the poll and the Conservative candidates took 79.6 per cent of the votes.[14]

In July 2015 Roe announced that she was seeking her party's nomination to stand as Mayor of London at the May 2016 election.[15][16] However, she was not shortlisted by the Conservatives.[17][18]

She was nominated for a life peerage in David Cameron's Resignation Honours and was created Baroness Couttie, of Downe in the County of Kent, on 5 September 2016.[19][20] Couttie is the surname of her husband Stephen.[5]

References

  1. 1 2 Ross Lydall, I run London's top council but still get home in time to put the children to bed dated 9 March 2012 in London Evening Standard online. Retrieved 21 July 2015
  2. ↑ Country Life dated 12 February 1987, p. 53: "Miss Philippa Roe, elder daughter of Mr James Roe and Mrs Roe, MP, of Petleys, Downe, Kent, and Temple House, Theobalds Park, Hertfordshire..."
  3. ↑ Philippa Roe profile at The Guardian online. Retrieved 25 July 2015
  4. ↑ E. R. Yescombe, Public-Private Partnerships: Principles of Policy and Finance (2011, ISBN 0080489575), p. 332 (bibliography); "Reforming the Private Finance Initiative" is quoted by Simon Jenkins in his Thatcher and Sons: A Revolution in Three Acts (2007), at p. 137
  5. 1 2 3 Ben Riley-Smith, My journey from cancer hell to the joy of twins by Tory hoping to become the new Boris in The Daily Telegraph online dated 11 July 2015. Retrieved 23 July 2015
  6. ↑ London Borough Council Elections May 2006 (2006) at london.gov.uk. Retrieved 30 July 2015
  7. ↑ Philippa Roe, Housing benefit cap was needed dated 24 June 2010 in The Guardian online. Retrieved 25 July 2015
  8. ↑ Ben Bloom, Philippa Roe to become new Westminster Council leader dated 1 March 2012 at hamhigh.co.uk. Retrieved 21 July 2015
  9. ↑ Peter Hetherington, Westminster's new leader hits back at 'social cleansing' accusations dated 13 March 2012 in The Guardian online. Retrieved 25 July 2015
  10. ↑ House of Commons, The Role of Local Government in Health Issues (Report of Communities and Local Government Committee, 2013), p. Ev 37
  11. ↑ Cabinet at westminster.gov.uk. Retrieved 21 July 2015
  12. ↑ Leader of Westminster sets out her vision for the future dated 15 January 2015 in The Guardian online. Retrieved 25 July 2015
  13. ↑ John Brown, Pat Gaudin, Wendy Moran, PR and Communication in Local Government and Public Services (2013, ISBN 0749466170), p. 256
  14. ↑ Knightsbridge and Belgravia ward election result 2014 at westminster.gov.uk. Retrieved 21 July 2015
  15. ↑ Tom Foot, Westminster Council leader Philippa Roe puts forward bid to be next Tory Mayor in West End Extra dated 10 July 2015. Retrieved 23 July 2015
  16. ↑ Tory mayoral hopeful: I would give mor epower to London's town halls
  17. ↑ London mayoral race: Tories shortlist four candidates dated 25 July 2015 at bbc.co.uk. Retrieved 26 July 2015
  18. ↑ Sol Campbell misses out in bid to become Mayor of London as Tory shortlist announced
  19. ↑ https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/543973/resignation_peerages_2016.pdf
  20. ↑ "No. 61700". The London Gazette. 9 September 2016. p. 19232.
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