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Sarah Brown
Sarah Brown in 2008
Spouse of the Prime Minister
of the United Kingdom
In office
27 June 2007 – 11 May 2010
MonarchElizabeth II
Prime MinisterGordon Brown
Preceded byCherie Blair
Succeeded bySamantha Cameron
Personal details
BornSarah Jane Macaulay
(1963-10-31) 31 October 1963 (age 61)
Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire, England
Political partyLabour
Spouse(s)Gordon Brown
(m. 2000–present)
ChildrenJennifer Jane (Deceased)
John Macaulay
James Fraser
ResidenceNorth Queensferry (private)
Alma materUniversity of Bristol

Sarah Jane Brown (née Macaulay; born 31 October 1963) is the wife of former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, the founder and president of Theirworld, a children's charity, and a founding partner of Hobsbawm Macaulay Communications, a public relations company. Brown is also the Executive Chair of the Global Business Coalition for Education and the co-founder of A World At School.

Early life

Sarah Jane Macaulay was born in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire on 31 October 1963. Her mother Pauline was a teacher and her father Iain worked for publisher Longman. Macaulay spent her early childhood in Fife, before moving to Tanzania. When she was 8 her parents separated. Both then remarried and her mother and stepfather took her and her two younger brothers, Sean and Bruce, to live in North London.

She was educated in North London at Acland Burghley School and Camden School for Girls, and took a psychology degree at the University of Bristol.

Career

After leaving university, Sarah Macaulay worked at the brand consultancy Wolff Olins. At age 30 she founded the public-relations firm Hobsbawm Macaulay, in partnership with an old school friend, Julia Hobsbawm. Their clients have included New Statesman (owned by Geoffrey Robinson) and the British Council. In 2001, she left Hobsbawm Macaulay after finding out she was pregnant with her first child.

In 2002 she founded the charity PiggyBankKids - now Theirworld - which began as a research fund to tackle complications in pregnancy, and in 2004 the charity founded the Jennifer Brown Research Laboratory at the University of Edinburgh. The laboratory's work is notable for its unified obstetric and neonatal approach to complications in pregnancy and childbirth, with a particular focus on preterm births.

In 2008 she started championing the cause of maternal health more intensively in her role as Global Patron of The White Ribbon Alliance for Safe Motherhood and co-founding of the Maternal Mortality Campaign. She also was appointed as a member of the External Advisory Group of the world-leading Centre for Maternal and Newborn Health at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine.

PiggyBankKids has since changed its name to Theirworld and broadened its work into a range of projects around disadvantaged children, with a particular focus on education through the A World at School platform, of which Brown is a co-founder.

Brown's strategic leadership on worldwide efforts to save and change the lives of women and children has been recognised with the Vision and Impact Award from the Global Business Coalition for Health, the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Global Leadership Award, an Honorary Fellowship from Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists and the Recognition Award from the International Federation of Gynaecology and Obstetrics, which she was awarded alongside UN Women Executive Director Michelle Bachelet.

Brown is also Patron of the CBI First Women Awards, which since 2004 have celebrated "pioneering women; successful role-models who have broken new ground and opened up opportunities for other women".

Marriage and children

She first met Gordon Brown briefly at a political event. In 1994, they shared a flight from London to Scotland for the Scottish Labour Party conference and after this meeting the two began seeing each other regularly.

The relationship was kept secret until 1997, when the News of the World published a picture of them together in a restaurant in London. They were married on 3 August 2000 in Brown's home town, North Queensferry, Fife.

On 28 December 2001 she gave birth prematurely to daughter Jennifer Jane, who died at 10 days old. Gordon Brown has spoken of Sarah's bravery after their daughter's death.

On 17 October 2003, she gave birth to their second child and first son, John. Another son, James Fraser, arrived on 17 July 2006 and was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis that November.

Brown listening to her husband's speech at the Diversity Reception, Labour conference, 2009

Public perception

As wife of the Prime Minister, Brown was generally viewed favourably. The Guardian noted her public image, saying, "her positive profile could be the best thing Labour has got going for it with the election looming." The 2010 general election saw no party command an overall majority, but the Conservative Party led by David Cameron had the most seats, and ultimately formed a government in coalition with the Liberal Democrats on 11 May 2010 after Gordon Brown's attempts to keep Labour in power failed.

Publication

Sarah with other leader spouses at the 34th G8 summit

Brown published a memoir of her role as the Prime Minister's Spouse, entitled Behind the Black Door through Ebury Press in 2011.

The book received an unfavourable reception from most reviewers. Written in a diary style, the London Evening Standard describes it as "perhaps the dimmest diary ever to have been professionally published" and "one long, formulaic press release in praise of Gordon Brown." The Telegraph concludes it is a "strange book" and "plea for redemption" though the reviewer decides that Brown's description of the international charity circuit is "fun at last". The Irish Independent describes the book as a "disturbingly giddy, schoolgirlish, exclamation mark-littered diary form" and "nothing in the slightest bit revelatory about it... tiptoeingly discreet", saying "Brown comes across in these pages as a decent and likeable" with "enough gossipy details to satisfy star-hungry readers."

In Brown's defence, the New Statesman review decides that the "thoughtfulness and courtesy" is "genuine Sarah Brown", though "so airbrushed as to leave the diary feeling a little empty."

Charitable work

Brown founded her own charity, PiggyBankKids, in 2002, which raises money for the Jennifer Brown Research Trust and supports a range of projects to help disadvantaged children. The charity was renamed and is now called Theirworld. Brown is the patron of domestic violence charity Women's Aid (from 2004, ongoing in 2013), of Maggie's Cancer Caring Centres (since 2007, ongoing in 2013), and of the SHINE Education Trust.

Brown is also a close friend of writer J.K. Rowling (who donated £1 million to the Labour Party in 2008), and the two co-authored a children's book for the One Parent Families charity organisation. She is a former patron of Gingerbread.

She is a member of the High Level Panel for Global Education.

The White Ribbon Alliance for Safe Motherhood and Maternal Mortality Campaign

File:Sarah Brown and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon at the 62nd World Health Assembly in Geneva.jpg
Sarah Brown and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon at the 62nd World Health Assembly in Geneva

In 2008, Sarah Brown became the Global Patron of The White Ribbon Alliance for Safe Motherhood, a international movement of both grassroots activists and organisations committed to maternal health and ending the needless deaths of women and children in pregnancy and childbirth.

In 2009, Brown gave the keynote speech at the World Health Organisation's 62nd World Health Assembly, alongside United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. In her speech she asked "where is the M in MCH?’ " in an echo of Allan Rosenfield's landmark Lancet article of 1985, highlighting that the numbers of women dying in pregnancy and childbirth were still the same 14 years later. Brown, with Bience Gawanas, was co-chair of the Leadership Group on Maternal and Newborn Mortality, launched in September 2009. Jens Stoltenberg, then Prime Minister of Norway, said "We welcome and support the establishment of this important group. Every minute a mother dies in pregnancy or childbirth... women need a strong voice that will bring attention to their plight and push for the support they need."

References

  1. http://gordonandsarahbrown.com/sarah-brown/
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  3. Andy Beckett (25 September 2009). "Can Sarah Brown rescue Labour?". London: Guardian. Retrieved 27 June 2010.
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  5. "Independent profile". London: Independent.co.uk. 3 June 2007. Retrieved 27 June 2010.
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  7. "Sarah Brown reveals trauma of her parents' split as she launches campaign to help broken Britain". London: Dailymail.co.uk. 18 December 2008. Retrieved 27 June 2010.
  8. Town vs gown: north London – Telegraph
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  10. "Chancellor's wife to quit full-time work". BBC News. 18 October 2001.
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  13. "LSTM Centre for Maternal and Newborn Health - EAG". Retrieved 6 August 2014.
  14. "Global Business Coalition for Health, Education, Access and Technology Lead the Field for the 2011 GBC Business Action on Health Awards". 29 May 2011. Retrieved 6 August 2014.
  15. Rahim, Kanani (12/07/2011). "Forbes - Sarah Brown and the Fight for Global Maternal and Newborn Health". Forbes. Retrieved 6 August 2014. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  16. "RCOG at XX FIGO World Congress". 10 October 2012. Retrieved 6 August 2014.
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  18. "Meet Britain's most pioneering business women". 21 April 2008. Retrieved 6 August 2014.
  19. "The First Women Awards" (PDF). Retrieved 6 August 2014.
  20. "Stephanie Wray shortlisted for First Women Awards". Retrieved 6 August 2014.
  21. Gaby Hinsliff (3 December 2006). "Inside the world of Mrs Brown". The Observer. London: The Guardian.
  22. "Snapper grabs photo of Chancellor with woman!". The Independent. findarticles.com. 29 June 1997. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  23. "Gordon and Sarah wed at home". BBC News. 3 August 2000.
  24. "Chancellor becomes a father". BBC News. 28 December 2001.
  25. "Browns' baby dies in hospital". BBC News. 7 January 2002.
  26. Nicholas Watt (12 February 2010). "Gordon Brown opens his heart on his baby's death, Sarah's bravery, and Blair | Politics". London: The Guardian. Retrieved 28 April 2010.
  27. "Browns celebrate baby boy". BBC News. 17 October 2003.
  28. "Brown names new baby James Fraser". BBC News. 18 July 2006.
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  31. Liz Hunt (30 July 2008). "What Sarah Brown could learn from Cherie Blair". The Telegraph. London. Retrieved 23 September 2008.
  32. "Sarah Brown: The new 'first lady'". BBC News. 28 June 2007. Retrieved 23 September 2008.
  33. "The Reinvention of Sarah Brown". London: The Guardian. 24 September 2009. Retrieved 29 September 2009.
  34. Sarah Brown (2011). Behind the Black Door. Ebury Press. ISBN 9780091940577.
  35. David Sexton (10 March 2011), "Behind the Black Door is inobservant, imperceptive and dull", London Evening Standard. Retrieved 18 June 2013.
  36. Tanya Gold (5 March 2011), "Behind the Black Door by Sarah Brown: review", The Telegraph. Retrieved 18 June 2013.
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  40. http://www.theirworld.org/history/
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  42. Sarah Brown (11 November 2006). "Why I want you to get behind Maggie's". The Scotsman.
  43. "SHINE Education Trust". Retrieved 6 August 2014.
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  46. Official Website, accessed 28 March 2013
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  49. "The World Post: A Changing Tide of Opinion for Girls and Women". 24 September 2009. Retrieved 5 August 2014.
  50. "Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (Norad): New leadership group will spearhead drive against maternal mortality". 13 March 2009. Retrieved 5 August 2014.

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Honorary titles
Preceded byCherie Blair Spouse of the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
2007–2010 		Succeeded bySamantha Cameron
Gordon Brown
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Shadow Cabinet elections
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