Penelope Fillon

Penelope Kathryn Fillon (née Clarke, 31 July 1955) is the Welsh wife of French former politician François Fillon. She was the Spouse of the Prime Minister of France from 17 May 2007 to 10 May 2012. Born and raised in Wales, Fillon is a graduate of the University College London and the University of Bristol Law School. She worked as an English teacher at a secondary school in France in the late 1970s, where she met her future husband. François and Penelope Fillon married in 1980 and have five children. They are Catholic.

Throughout her husband's political career, she has remained fairly uninvolved in national politics and has mostly stayed out of the public eye, and has been labelled "discreet" by the media. Despite her reputation as being private, Fillon ran for a seat on the municipal council of the Solesmes, Sarthe commune in which she and her husband reside. When François Fillon began running for the French presidency in 2017, she emerged in the public eye to campaign for her husband.

Penelope Fillon rose to prominence in January 2017, when French newspaper Le Canard enchaîné published an article in which she was accused of being paid €500,000 in public money over eight years as her husband's "assistant" while performing no or very little work. The public outcry that followed led the controversy to be labelled "Penelopegate" by some, despite her husband denying any wrongdoing.

Biography

Early life and education

Penelope Kathryn Clarke was born on 31 July 1955 in Llanover, Monmouthshire, Wales, United Kingdom. The daughter of George "Colin" Clarke, an English solicitor, and Glenys, a Wales native, she considers herself "Anglo-Welsh."