She was described as the coolest girl in college when she first started dating Andy Burnham.
More than three decades later, Marie-France van Heel could be about to walk into Downing Street alongside her husband to take on one of the most powerful unofficial roles in government – the prime minister’s spouse.
Considered the favourite to replace Sir Keir Starmer in No 10, Burnham met Dutch-born van Heel, known as Frankie, when she started studying at Fitzwilliam College at the University of Cambridge in 1989.
He was in his second year of an English Literature degree, and Burnham’s former lecturer, John Mullan, wrote in the Times that other students thought he had scooped the pools when they began dating.
Van Heel was born in January 1970, the same month as Burnham, and grew up in the Netherlands and Belgium before moving to the UK.
Although they started dating at university, van Heel had a surprising request in the early days of their relationship, when she asked Burnham if she could go on Cilla Black’s TV dating show Blind Date – and he agreed.
So in 1992, wearing flares, a bottle green jacket and a yellow headband over her bobbed blonde hair, van Heel appeared on the hit ITV programme.
She chose Will from Surrey to be her date on a holiday to Gibraltar, but the pair did not hit it off.
Having quickly reunited, Burnham and van Heel were reportedly in a bar in Parliament 12 years later when Will walked in, having become the director of communications for the Conservative Party.
