58 Facts About Jacqui Smith

Jacqueline Jill Smith was born on 3 November 1962 and is a British broadcaster, political commentator and former Labour Party politician.

Jacqui Smith was Member of Parliament for Redditch from 1997 to 2010.

Jacqui Smith served as Home Secretary from 2007 to 2009 and was the first woman to hold the position.

Jacqui Smith attended Hertford College, Oxford, before training to become a teacher at Worcester College of Higher Education and having a career as an economics and business studies teacher.

Jacqui Smith was elected for Redditch at the 1997 general election.

Jacqui Smith joined the government in 1999 and served in a series of ministerial positions under Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Jacqui Smith resigned as Home Secretary in June 2009 following her involvement in the United Kingdom parliamentary expenses scandal in which she had falsely claimed that a room in her sister's house was her main home.

Jacqui Smith's parents were teachers, and both Labour councillors, although her mother briefly joined the Social Democratic Party.

Jacqui Smith worked as secretary of the National Organisation of Labour Students and describes herself as having a "feminist background".

Jacqui Smith served on Redditch Borough Council from 1991 to 1996, where she chaired the development committee.

Jacqui Smith was selected through an all-women shortlist as the Labour candidate for Redditch, a new constituency created after a boundary review.

Jacqui Smith won the seat in the 1997 general election, as part of a record number of female MPs elected to the House of Commons.

Jacqui Smith entered the Government in July 1999, as a Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Education and Employment, working with the Minister for School Standards Estelle Morris.

Jacqui Smith then became a Minister of State at the Department of Health after the 2001 general election.

Jacqui Smith was appointed as deputy Minister for Women in 2003, working alongside Secretary of State Patricia Hewitt.

Teacher trade union sources stated that Jacqui Smith "talked to us on our level".

Jacqui Smith was regarded as a loyal Blairite during Tony Blair's premiership, a position reflected in her voting record, and she was brought to tears by Blair's farewell appearance in the House of Commons.

In Gordon Brown's first cabinet reshuffle on 28 June 2007, Jacqui Smith expressed interest in becoming Secretary of State for Education, but was appointed Home Secretary.

Jacqui Smith became the first woman to hold the position and the third woman to hold one of the Great Offices of State, after Margaret Thatcher and Margaret Beckett.

Jacqui Smith introduced a crime mapping scheme to allow citizens of England and Wales to access local crime information and how to combat crime.

Jacqui Smith managed to pass the 42-day detention law plans in the House of Commons, despite heavy opposition.

In March 2009, Jacqui Smith published the first ever public Counter Terror Strategy.

When Conservative MP Damian Green was arrested in his Commons office, Jacqui Smith stated that she was not informed of the impending arrest.

Jacqui Smith was not charged, but he was suspended from his Home Office job while the investigation continued.

Jacqui Smith was later dismissed from his position for gross misconduct.

Jacqui Smith ran the Home Office at the time of this alleged instruction.

Jacqui Smith defended her decision to use high-street shops, and stated that the hope was to make enrolment in the scheme a less intimidating experience and to make the cards easier to access.

Jacqui Smith claimed, despite evidence to the contrary, that the majority of the population was in favour of the scheme.

Jacqui Smith's compromise was to scale down the length of time that data could be kept, with a maximum limit of 12 years.

On 19 July 2007, Jacqui Smith admitted to smoking cannabis a few times in Oxford in the 1980s.

Jacqui Smith's admission was made public the day after Gordon Brown appointed her head of a new government review of UK drugs strategy.

In May 2008, against the recommendations of her own scientific advisers, Jacqui Smith reversed the government's 2004 decision to downgrade cannabis to a class C drug, returning it to the status of class B, with the law change taking effect on 26 January 2009.

In February 2009, Jacqui Smith was accused by Nutt of making a political decision in rejecting the scientific advice to downgrade ecstasy from a class A drug.

Jacqui Smith was widely criticised by the scientific community for bullying Professor Nutt into apologising for his factual comments that, in the course of a normal year, more people died from falling off horses than died from taking ecstasy.

On 5 May 2009, Jacqui Smith named 16 "undesirable individuals", including convicted murderers and advocates of violence, who were to be banned from entering the United Kingdom over their alleged threat to public order.

Jacqui Smith was investigated by the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards over accusations that she had inappropriately designated her sister's home in London as her main residence.

Jacqui Smith said that she had followed advice from parliamentary authorities.

On 8 February 2009, it was reported in the media that Jacqui Smith had designated a house in London owned by her sister as her main residence in order to claim a parliamentary allowance for her house in Redditch as a secondary home, despite explicitly stating on her website that she "lives in Redditch".

Jacqui Smith said it was a mistake, and she would repay the amount.

The reports made clear that the films had been viewed in the family home at a time when Jacqui Smith was not present, and that she had given her husband, Richard Timney, a "real ear-bashing" over the incident.

Jacqui Smith was one of the highest profile politicians involved in the expenses scandal and citing the impact on her family life she later resigned.

Jacqui Smith concluded that, although her London home was a genuine home and she had spent more nights there than in her Redditch home, her constituency home was in fact her main home, and that she was in breach of Commons rules, despite "significant mitigating circumstances".

On 2 June 2009, Jacqui Smith confirmed that she would leave the Cabinet in the next reshuffle, expected after the local and European elections.

Jacqui Smith said that she had been "immensely honoured" to serve Redditch.

Jacqui Smith applied to be vice-chairman of the BBC Trust.

Jacqui Smith presented a documentary on pornography, for BBC Radio 5 Live, called Porn Again which was broadcast on 3 March 2011.

Jacqui Smith has regularly been on This Week and Question Time and was a regular weekly commentator on Sky News' Press Preview.

Jacqui Smith contributed to The Purple Book in 2011, putting forward new ideas on crime and policing.

On 24 August 2011 it emerged that Jacqui Smith had arranged for two prisoners on day-release to paint a room in her house, when they were supposed to be undertaking work to benefit the community.

The Ministry of Justice launched an internal investigation into the matter, and Jacqui Smith made a donation to the charity overseeing the scheme.

Jacqui Smith became chair of University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust in December 2013, though in 2020 she stepped down from this role temporarily to perform in Strictly Come Dancing.

Jacqui Smith publicly supported the campaign for the UK to remain in the European Union in the 2016 EU referendum, and continued to argue for a second referendum on the issue until the 2019 general election.

Since 2017, Jacqui Smith has co-hosted a weekly political and current affairs podcast, entitled For The Many, alongside LBC broadcaster Iain Dale.

Jacqui Smith has appeared on Good Morning Britain on ITV.

Jacqui Smith is the chair of both the Jo Cox Foundation and the Sandwell Children's Trust.

In September 2020, it was announced that Jacqui Smith would compete in the eighteenth series of Strictly Come Dancing.

Jacqui Smith was partnered with Anton Du Beke, and became the first celebrity to be voted off the show.

Jacqui Smith married Richard Timney in October 1987 and they have two sons.