Captain Blackbeard
09-07-2009, 06:00 PM
The young O'Blairs... Former Prime Minister's children have Irish passports, thanks to their grandmother
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2009/09/05/article-1211450-0286E9AE0000044D-231_468x362.jpg
Tony Blair's four children have Irish citizenship – with at least one, Kathryn, using her Eire passport to travel.
The revelation came from Cherie Blair on a TV chat show, when she said Kathryn, Euan, Nicky and Leo had Irish passports through their grandmother, Tony’s mother Hazel.
‘She came from a Protestant family, but from Ireland, and it’s because of her that my four children all have Irish passports,’ Mrs Blair told Irish TV’s The Late Late Show
She said Kathryn had red hair ‘like her grandmother’, adding: ‘Whenever she travels on Ryanair, she always takes her Irish passport.’
Mrs Blair also put her father actor Tony Booth’s charm down to ‘our Irish background’.
Hazel, daughter of Orangeman George Corscadden, was born above the family grocery store in Ballyshannon, County Donegal.
Her death from cancer at 52 in the mid-Seventies while Tony was studying at Oxford is said to have had a profound influence on his ambitions and attitude towards the Troubles.
The Blair children can be Irish citizens irrespective of their parents’ nationality. They also have British passports. Their parents have only British passports.
Mrs Blair has also told Italian paper La Repubblica that Nicky and Kathryn were taunted at school over their father’s decision to send troops into Iraq in 2003 to stop Saddam developing weapons of mass destruction.
‘They had some really difficult moments at school. Everybody called their father a liar,’ she said.
She added that her worst experience at No10 was her miscarriage in 2002. ‘Two years after Leo was born, at 47 I was newly pregnant and I lost the baby,’ she said.
‘We were about to go on holiday and Alistair Campbell called and asked for a statement to explain why the holiday had been cancelled. We had to tell the truth as otherwise there would have been speculation we were divorcing.’
She denied being the driving force behind Tony’s conversion to Catholicism in 2007, though ten days ago Mr Blair told a religious conference: ‘Frankly, this all began with my wife.’
Mrs Blair also told British Airways’ in-flight magazine that a disappointment was never launching a warship.
‘My grandfather was a merchant seaman and it is one of my regrets,’ she said.
The nearest she got was launching the ferry Pride of Hull in 2001.
Source (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1211450/The-young-OBlairs--Former-Prime-Ministers-children-Irish-passports-thanks-grandmother.html)
Son of an Irish woman and son of a Scotsman. I never knew he was half-Irish. It goes along way to understanding why he loved holding onto that lovely British flag and held no emotion in destroying England.
http://img403.imageshack.us/img403/4915/spednc7.gif
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2009/09/05/article-1211450-0286E9AE0000044D-231_468x362.jpg
Tony Blair's four children have Irish citizenship – with at least one, Kathryn, using her Eire passport to travel.
The revelation came from Cherie Blair on a TV chat show, when she said Kathryn, Euan, Nicky and Leo had Irish passports through their grandmother, Tony’s mother Hazel.
‘She came from a Protestant family, but from Ireland, and it’s because of her that my four children all have Irish passports,’ Mrs Blair told Irish TV’s The Late Late Show
She said Kathryn had red hair ‘like her grandmother’, adding: ‘Whenever she travels on Ryanair, she always takes her Irish passport.’
Mrs Blair also put her father actor Tony Booth’s charm down to ‘our Irish background’.
Hazel, daughter of Orangeman George Corscadden, was born above the family grocery store in Ballyshannon, County Donegal.
Her death from cancer at 52 in the mid-Seventies while Tony was studying at Oxford is said to have had a profound influence on his ambitions and attitude towards the Troubles.
The Blair children can be Irish citizens irrespective of their parents’ nationality. They also have British passports. Their parents have only British passports.
Mrs Blair has also told Italian paper La Repubblica that Nicky and Kathryn were taunted at school over their father’s decision to send troops into Iraq in 2003 to stop Saddam developing weapons of mass destruction.
‘They had some really difficult moments at school. Everybody called their father a liar,’ she said.
She added that her worst experience at No10 was her miscarriage in 2002. ‘Two years after Leo was born, at 47 I was newly pregnant and I lost the baby,’ she said.
‘We were about to go on holiday and Alistair Campbell called and asked for a statement to explain why the holiday had been cancelled. We had to tell the truth as otherwise there would have been speculation we were divorcing.’
She denied being the driving force behind Tony’s conversion to Catholicism in 2007, though ten days ago Mr Blair told a religious conference: ‘Frankly, this all began with my wife.’
Mrs Blair also told British Airways’ in-flight magazine that a disappointment was never launching a warship.
‘My grandfather was a merchant seaman and it is one of my regrets,’ she said.
The nearest she got was launching the ferry Pride of Hull in 2001.
Source (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1211450/The-young-OBlairs--Former-Prime-Ministers-children-Irish-passports-thanks-grandmother.html)
Son of an Irish woman and son of a Scotsman. I never knew he was half-Irish. It goes along way to understanding why he loved holding onto that lovely British flag and held no emotion in destroying England.
http://img403.imageshack.us/img403/4915/spednc7.gif