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==Biography==
==Biography==
Mensch was born in [[London]] in 1971, the daughter of Nicholas Wilfrid Bagshawe and Daphne Margaret née Triggs.<ref>{{cite news|title=Marriages|newspaper=The Times|date=23 September 1969|page=12}}</ref> Her father comes from a family of Catholic gentry;<ref>[http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=PED&db=landgent&id=I3748 The Landed Gentry of Britain]</ref> his grandfather was the marine artist [[Joseph Richard Bagshawe]], who was himself grandson of one of the 19th century's most renowned marine artists [[Clarkson Stanfield]]<ref>{{cite|title="''Stanfield, Clarkson''" Grove Dictionary of Art|author=David Cordingly|editor=Jane Turner|publisher=[[Macmillan Publishers]]|date=1996}}</ref>, and a nephew of the Most Rev. [[Edward Gilpin Bagshawe]] [[D.D.]], [[Bishop of Nottingham (Roman Catholic)|Catholic Bishop of Nottingham]]. Her paternal grandmother Mary Frideswide was the daughter of Charles Robertson, [[Order of St. Gregory the Great|KSG]], a stockbroker and benefactor of St Philip's Priory, [[Begbroke]] and one of the co-founders of [[Westminster Cathedral]].<ref>{{cite|title=The Catholic Who's Who and yearbook, Volume 33|date=1940|page=432}}</ref>
Mensch was born in [[London]] in 1971, the daughter of Nicholas Wilfrid Bagshawe and Daphne Margaret née Triggs.<ref>{{cite news|title=Marriages|newspaper=The Times|date=23 September 1969|page=12}}</ref> Her father comes from a family of Catholic '[[gentry|gentry]]';<ref>[http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=PED&db=landgent&id=I3748 The Landed Gentry of Britain]</ref> his grandfather was the marine artist [[Joseph Richard Bagshawe]], who was himself grandson of one of the 19th century's most renowned marine artists [[Clarkson Stanfield]]<ref>{{cite|title="''Stanfield, Clarkson''" Grove Dictionary of Art|author=David Cordingly|editor=Jane Turner|publisher=[[Macmillan Publishers]]|date=1996}}</ref>, and a nephew of the Most Rev. [[Edward Gilpin Bagshawe]] [[D.D.]], [[Bishop of Nottingham (Roman Catholic)|Catholic Bishop of Nottingham]]. Her paternal grandmother Mary Frideswide was the daughter of Charles Robertson, [[Order of St. Gregory the Great|KSG]], a stockbroker and benefactor of St Philip's Priory, [[Begbroke]] and one of the co-founders of [[Westminster Cathedral]].<ref>{{cite|title=The Catholic Who's Who and yearbook, Volume 33|date=1940|page=432}}</ref>


Her family moved to the country when she was seven. She was educated at [[Beechwood Sacred Heart School|Sacred Heart School]], [[Tunbridge Wells]],<ref>{{cite|title=Who's Who 2011|publisher=A & C Black|date=2011}}</ref> and [[Woldingham School]], a Catholic girls' boarding school in Surrey, and was named "Young Poet of the Year" in 1989 at the age of 18.<ref name=beeb>{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/question_time/7181778.stm|publisher=BBC News|title=Question Time:This week's panel|date=10-January- 2008|accessdate=2010-05-16}}</ref> After reading [[English literature]] at [[Christ Church, Oxford]],<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.chch.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/ccm-09.pdf}}</ref> Mensch worked as a press officer with [[EMI Records]] (a position from which she was formally dismissed),<ref name=BBC14342674/> and then a marketing official with [[Sony Music Entertainment|Sony]].
Her family moved to the country when she was seven. She was educated at [[Beechwood Sacred Heart School|Sacred Heart School]], [[Tunbridge Wells]],<ref>{{cite|title=Who's Who 2011|publisher=A & C Black|date=2011}}</ref> and [[Woldingham School]], a Catholic girls' boarding school in Surrey, and was named "Young Poet of the Year" in 1989 at the age of 18.<ref name=beeb>{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/question_time/7181778.stm|publisher=BBC News|title=Question Time:This week's panel|date=10-January- 2008|accessdate=2010-05-16}}</ref> After reading [[English literature]] at [[Christ Church, Oxford]],<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.chch.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/ccm-09.pdf}}</ref> Mensch worked as a press officer with [[EMI Records]] (a position from which she was formally dismissed),<ref name=BBC14342674/> and then a marketing official with [[Sony Music Entertainment|Sony]].

Revision as of 21:46, 25 August 2011

Louise Mensch
MP
Member of Parliament
for Corby
Incumbent
Assumed office
6 May 2010
Preceded byPhil Hope
Majority1,951 (3.6%)
Personal details
Born (1971-06-28) 28 June 1971 (age 53)
London
NationalityEnglish
Political partyConservative
SpousePeter Mensch
ChildrenThree
ResidenceOundle
Alma materChrist Church, Oxford
ProfessionAuthor
Websitewww.louisebagshawe.net/
www.louisebagshawebooks.com/

Louise Daphne Mensch (born Louise Daphne Bagshawe, 28 June 1971) is an English author and Conservative Party politician. She is the Member of Parliament (MP) for Corby, having won the seat at the 2010 general election. She is also a well-known author of "chick lit" fiction, writing under her maiden name.

Biography

Mensch was born in London in 1971, the daughter of Nicholas Wilfrid Bagshawe and Daphne Margaret née Triggs.[2] Her father comes from a family of Catholic 'gentry';[3] his grandfather was the marine artist Joseph Richard Bagshawe, who was himself grandson of one of the 19th century's most renowned marine artists Clarkson Stanfield[4], and a nephew of the Most Rev. Edward Gilpin Bagshawe D.D., Catholic Bishop of Nottingham. Her paternal grandmother Mary Frideswide was the daughter of Charles Robertson, KSG, a stockbroker and benefactor of St Philip's Priory, Begbroke and one of the co-founders of Westminster Cathedral.[5]

Her family moved to the country when she was seven. She was educated at Sacred Heart School, Tunbridge Wells,[6] and Woldingham School, a Catholic girls' boarding school in Surrey, and was named "Young Poet of the Year" in 1989 at the age of 18.[7] After reading English literature at Christ Church, Oxford,[8] Mensch worked as a press officer with EMI Records (a position from which she was formally dismissed),[9] and then a marketing official with Sony.

Her first novel, Career Girls, was published in 1995 and has been followed by 13 subsequent works in the "chick lit" genre aimed at young women. She has defended chick-lit against allegations, specifically by psychologist Susan Quilliam, that the books cause irrationally high expectations which "ruin readers' lives" by saying that that such books merely make readers raise their standards.[10]

Politics

At the age of fourteen she had joined the Conservative Party, after being inspired by then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher,[11] but in 1996 she briefly switched to Tony Blair's Labour Party saying she believed him to be "socially liberal but an economic Tory".[12] By 1997 she had returned to the Conservatives and helped her mother, Daphne, win a seat in East Sussex County Council from the Liberal Democrats.[11] In 2001, Mensch co-founded the Oxonian Society with Joseph Pascal and HRH Princess Badiya bint El Hassan of Jordan.[13]

Political career

Mensch was placed on the A-List of Conservative candidates in 2006. This move was criticised by David Burrowes, from the socially conservative Cornerstone Group of Tory MPs, as favouring "minor celebrities", such as Mensch, over local candidates when selecting prospective parliamentary candidates.[14] In October 2006 she was selected to stand in Corby.[15] As part of her campaigning for the 2010 election, she appeared on Question Time[7] and BBC One's The Big Questions.[16] She believes the foxhunting ban should be repealed on civil liberties grounds and that it was also a waste of Parliamentary time.[17]

In the 2010 general election Mensch won the seat of Corby with a majority of 1,951, defeating Labour incumbent Phil Hope, and in June 2010 she was elected by other Conservative MPs to serve on the Select Committee for the Department of Culture, Media and Sport.[18]

She was a guest on Have I Got News for You on 22 April 2011. Her contribution was briefly censored because she alluded to the identity of a footballer involved in a super-injunction case.[19]

On 19 July 2011, in the House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee, Mensch took part in the questioning of James and Rupert Murdoch over the News of the World phone hacking scandal.

Political blogger Bagehot in the The Economist whilst admitting he had not previously been impressed named Mensch as the "surprise star" of the hearing saying her "sharp, precise, coolly scornful questions" contrasted with her "waffling, pompous" fellow committee members.[20] Mensch later faced criticism for incorrectly claiming during the committee that Piers Morgan had written in his autobiography about conducting phone hacking while he was the editor of the Daily Mirror.[21] When challenged on CNN by Morgan, Mensch cited the protection of parliamentary privilege and refused to withdraw the allegation. However, she also refused to repeat it outside parliament, as it would leave her vulnerable to unlimited civil damages from Morgan.[22] She later apologised to Morgan, admitting that she had misread a newspaper report about the book.[23]

Three days after Mensch put questions to James and Rupert Murdoch at the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee, she received an email alleging that she had taken a controlled substance with Nigel Kennedy at Ronnie Scott's club in Birmingham in the 1990s while working as a press officer for the EMI record company.[24] Mensch publicly released the email and admitted the allegations were "highly probable", but said she would not be deterred from asking further questions about phone hacking.[9][25]

Following the 2011 England riots Mench called for social media services Twitter and Facebook to be shut down or to "take an hour off" during disturbances to stop the spread of false rumours wasting police resources.[26] She compared the action with brief interruptions to road and rail networks during emergencies.[26] However "other Twitter users" compared such action to Iran and China whilst Sussex police said they had used Twitter to stop rumours.[26]

Personal life

Louise Bagshawe married Peter Mensch, manager of Metallica and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, in June 2011.[27] She has three children from her previous marriage to property speculator Anthony LoCicero.[11][28] She is the sister of Tilly Bagshawe, a freelance journalist who published Adored in July 2005, and has a younger sister Alice and a brother, James.[29]

Bibliography

  • Career Girls (1995)
  • The Movie (1996)
  • Tall Poppies (1997)
  • Venus Envy (1998)
  • A Kept Woman (2000)
  • When She Was Bad... (2001)
  • The Devil You Know (2003)
  • Monday's Child (2004)
  • Tuesday's Child (2005)
  • Sparkles (2006)
  • Glamour (2007)
  • Glitz (2008)
  • Passion (2009)
  • Desire (2010)
  • Destiny (2011)

References

  1. ^ "I cant believe Im a Tory". The Times. London. 2006-05-14.
  2. ^ "Marriages". The Times. 23 September 1969. p. 12.
  3. ^ The Landed Gentry of Britain
  4. ^ David Cordingly (1996), Jane Turner (ed.), "Stanfield, Clarkson" Grove Dictionary of Art, Macmillan Publishers
  5. ^ The Catholic Who's Who and yearbook, Volume 33, 1940, p. 432
  6. ^ Who's Who 2011, A & C Black, 2011
  7. ^ a b "Question Time:This week's panel". BBC News. 10-January- 2008. Retrieved 2010-05-16. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  8. ^ http://www.chch.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/ccm-09.pdf. {{cite news}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
  9. ^ a b Victoria King (29 July 2011). "Tory MP Louise Mensch 'probably took drugs in club'". BBC News. Retrieved 29 July 2011.
  10. ^ Louise Mensch (2011-07--08). "Chick-lit doesn't damage its readers, it just makes them raise their standards". Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 2011-07--08. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  11. ^ a b c "Louise Bagshawe profile".
  12. ^ "'He sees women as equals'". London: BBC News. 2006-06-05. Retrieved 2008-04-28.
  13. ^ http://www.oxoniansociety.com/About.asp
  14. ^ "'Beautiful' Tory list under fire". BBC News. 2006-04-19. Retrieved 2008-04-28.
  15. ^ 'Chick-lit' author to stand at next general election, Northampton Chronicle, 13 October 2006. Retrieved on 28 April 2008.
  16. ^ "BBC One Programmes - The Big Questions, Series 2, Episode 21". BBC. 14 Jun 2009. Retrieved 7-May-2010. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  17. ^ Louise Bagshawe, ConservativeHome, 14 June 2006. Retrieved on 14 June 2006.
  18. ^ "Westminster select committees: Labour & Tory membership". Financial Times. June 24, 2010. Retrieved 29-Jun-2010. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  19. ^ . Daily Mail. 23 April 2011 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1379727/Gagging-order-judges-free-speech-privacy-celebrities.html. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)
  20. ^ . The Economist. 19 July 2011 http://www.economist.com/blogs/bagehot/2011/07/british-press-and-phone-hacking-scandal-8. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)
  21. ^ "Phone hacking: Piers Morgan in on-air hacking row with Louise Mensch". The Daily Telegraph. 20 July 2011. Retrieved 20 July 2011.
  22. ^ Piers Morgan Refutes Hacking Allegations On CNN cnn.com, 2011-07-20.
  23. ^ "MP Mensch apologises to Piers Morgan for hacking slur". BBC News. 29 July 2011. Retrieved 29 July 2011.
  24. ^ Sanchez, Raf (29 July 2011). "Louise Mensch releases email allegations made by journalist". The Independent. London. Retrieved 29 July 2011.
  25. ^ "Louise Mensch comes clean on Morgan, drugs and bad dancing". Channel 4 News. 29 July 2011. Retrieved 29 July 2011.
  26. ^ a b c Martin Beckford (12 Aug 2011). "Louise Mensch MP calls for Twitter and Facebook blackout during riots". Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 14 Aug 2011.
  27. ^ Walker, Tim (3 June 2011). "Tory MP Louise Bagshawe secretly marries Metallica manager Peter Mensch". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 2 June 2011.
  28. ^ Walker, Tim (27 May 2007). "Chick lit Tory candidate Louise Bagshawe splits from husband". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 2009-07-27.
  29. ^ Scott, Caroline (6 March 2005). "Relative Values: Tilly and Louise Bagshawe". The Sunday Times.


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