Gina Coladangelo: is Matt Hancock’s ‘charismatic’ new partner behind his extraordinary rebrand?
Strolling hand-in-hand through Chelsea Flower Show. Speaking about how they couldnât help but â[fall] in loveâ on Steven Bartlettâs Diary of a CEO podcast. Embracing in front of the worldâs cameras on his exit from the Australian jungle.
These are just some of the public appearances Matt Hancock, 44, and Gina Coladangelo, 45, have made over the 18 months since pictures of their steamy extramarital affair were beamed across the world.
Photographs of the PR guru and millionaire lobbyist kissing the then-health secretary first emerged in June 2021, triggering his resignation and prompting him to leave his wife and children in one of the most salacious government scandals of the pandemic.
The pair kept a low profile for a brief period after the news, but since then: a rebrand â or several attempts at one. The latest, of course, being Hancockâs shock announcement last month that heâd be jetting into the Australian jungle to take part in the latest series of Iâm A Celebrity in a bid to âengage with votersâ, losing him the Tory whip and prompting a furious backlash from Tory MPs, including Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who says he should be âworking hard for his constituentsâ instead of galavanting with celebrities in the jungle.
After three extraordinary weeks on-screen (highlights: his six consecutive Bushtucker trials, his dressing down from campmates including ITV newsreader Charlene White, his karaoke attempt), Hancock made it to last nightâs final, finishing in third place behind Hollyoaks star Owen Warner and eventual winner, Lioness Jill Scott.
Pictures last week showed his long-awaited reunion with Coladangelo â who left her husband, Oliver Tress, and three children to âset up homeâ with him after the affair was outed â her in elegant linen trousers and a crop top; him still in his jungle attire; both unable to keep their hands off each other after weeks apart.
And thatâs just the beginning of Hancockâs extraordinary rebrand: this week, just days after his jungle exit, Hancock is set to release his new memoir Pandemic Diaries: The Inside Story Of Britainâs Battle Against Covid. So was Coladangelo behind this attempted rebrand? How much will we learn about their relationship in the new book? And whatâs next?
Former colleagues described Hancockâs former £15,000-a-year adviser as a âcharmingâ and âdrivenâ woman at the time their affair was revealed, adding that Coladangelo possesses âthat confidence you see in ex-public schoolboysâ and that they were âshocked but not surprisedâ by news of hers and Hancockâs romance. Indeed, the coupleâs steamy clinch might have looked like a fledgling teenage romance, but they have a long history dating back to university days. So had the writing been on the wall for some time â and will their romance go the distance?
From her marriage to Oliver Bonas founder Oliver Tress to her close working relationship with Hancock during the Covid crisis, hereâs everything we know about the woman behind the former health secretary.
From privileged beginnings to the heart of Whitehall
Certainly, the story of the woman who wooed Whitehall starts with privileged beginnings. To those who knew her, Coladangelo was hardly the kind of character to end up in a scandal.
âShe was very composed and elegant,â says university peer and broadcast journalist Maxie Allen, who attended her âglamorousâ 21st birthday party at her parentsâ home in Royston, Hertfordshire. âGina is not the sort of person to get drunk and make a scene.â
Coladangeloâs mother was a florist and her Italian father made his millions as CEO of pharmaceutical consultancy Rephine. Rino Coladangeloâs business was not the only early sign of his daughterâs future position in the health department: he was also a member of the Royal College of Physicians and managing director of an NHS hospital, while her younger brother, Roberto, 42, is an executive director at Partnering Health.
When the pictures of Coladangelo and Hancock emerged last year, Coladangeloâs father spoke out in his daughterâs defence. From his 16th century listed former farmhouse near Royston, Hertfordshire, he told the MailOnline: âMy daughter is a wonderful woman,â but refused to comment on the affair rumours any further.
A love story born at Oxford
Hancock and Coladangelo met at Oxford and both studied philosophy, politics, and economics (PPE), with friends saying Coladangelo was âway out of Matt Hancockâs leagueâ at university.
Their friendship was reportedly born from a love of student radio. But if she was the Mishal Husain of Oxygen FM, Hancock was the minor sports reporter.
âHe had a very slight presence, not someone you would mark out as destined for greatness. Whereas Gina was very well-known and high-profile and memorable,â fellow broadcaster Allen told the Sunday Mirror after their affair was revealed.
He said Coladangelo was âsuaveâ, while Hancock cut an âobscure figureâ and kept a âlow profileâ during their years as presenters. Coladangelo would sometimes read the sport with Hancock and colleagues say he eventually left the station when denied the chance to present a politics show.
âGina was very glamorous, very nice, and very good looking,â Allen added. âAll the young men held a candle for her.â Presumably, Hancock was one such man, despite meeting his future wife, Martha Miller, at some point during his three years at Exeter College, Oxford.
Due to studying the same course and their radio run-ins, he and Coladangelo became âclosest friendsâ.
Gina was very glamorous, very nice, and very good-looking - all the young men held a candle for her
broadcaster Maxie Allen
In the past, Coladangelo has confirmed their close relationship at the station. âI read the news and Matt read the sport,â she recalled in a programme on BBC Radio 4 in April last year. âIâve always joked with him that he did the sport because he wasnât good enough to do the news, but I think it gave him a bit of an early heads up into aggressive questioning from journalists and hacks.â
The pair was said to have been âinseparableâ during their student radio days and remained close, Hancock reportedly celebrating Christmas with Coladangelo and her husband and relying on her for big decisions during lockdown.
Was the writing always on the wall?
Some say the writing for the Hancock-Coladangelo affair had been on the wall for some time. âThe longer the wait the sweeter the kiss,â reads one of a series of cryptic relationship-related posts Coladangelo shared on her Pinterest wall in May 2020, despite reportedly denying the affair when asked three years ago.
Others at the centre of Government say they were shocked when the story broke. âI had no idea something was going on, but theyâve always been incredibly close,â a former government staffer told the Standard last year. âWeâve probably all got those friends where youâve known each other 20 years and have always been very, very closely platonic... something obviously just changed.â
Whether Miller and Coladangelo met at university is not yet known, but they became friends on Facebook sometime in the 23 years since. Was the seed for the future affair planted under the mistletoe or even earlier, in a cramped, breeze-block recording studio beneath an Oxford nightclub called 5th Avenue?
Little is known about the pairâs love lives in the years immediately after they graduated in 1998, though presumably Hancock was still with girlfriend Miller. But Coladangelo married London property lawyer Glynn Gibb in 2004 and Hancock eventually married Miller, who became an osteopath, in 2006. Did he give up chasing Coladangelo when Gibb came on the scene? âI have no comment to make on the matter,â Gibb said from his Chestertons email in the week after the affair was exposed.
Coladangeloâs first marriage was short-lived. She and Gibb divorced when she was on the management buyout team at lobbying firm Luther Pendragon.
âThe MBO [management buyout] finished her first marriage because she was just taking so much time doing that,â says a former high-up at the firm, who recalls Coladangelo as being âincredibly drivenâ with âthat confidence you see in ex-public schoolboysâ, adding: âI wouldnât say she had many female friends.â
Another former colleague at Luther told the Standard that âshe can be very charming and charismatic and sheâs great with clients. Male clients just used to think she was amazing. She is very beautiful, obviously.â
I worked with Gina. She is incredibly driven with that confidence you see in ex-public schoolboys
In 2009, Coladangelo married Oliver Tress, the £12 million founder of fashion and lifestyle empire Oliver Bonas. They started a family together in Clapham Junction before upgrading to a five-bedroom, £4 million home in Wandsworth in 2015.
âI donât worry about my children being closer to their nanny, because I spend as much time as I can with them,â Coladangelo told the Daily Mail in 2012, under a feature headlined Can a woman be too clever to be a stay-at-home mum?.
She was working as a marketing and communications director for Oliver Bonas at the time and said she would never dream of telling other mothers what to do with their lives. She added: âEvery woman has to make her own choice. But I feel very fortunate in my education and believe those years shouldnât be wasted. I want to work to give something back.â
Outside of London, Tress is also known to own or have owned a second property near West Wittering beach in West Sussex, where his wealthy neighbours include Sweaty Betty founder Simon Hill-Norton. They have also spent a lot of time in Europe.
âMy wife is half-Italian. Her family have an apartment in the Alps and my parents have a farmhouse in Umbria, so we spend a lot of time there,â Tress told the Independent in 2012. âI yearn to take my family on an adventure - to live somewhere with a completely different culture.â
Coladangelo has been a fixture at society events, from the opening of Tabitha Webbâs boutique in Belgravia, to the V&A Summer Party in 2019. âThis is 3am,â wrote Webb, under an Instagram of her and Coladangelo cosying up in a fur coat with This Morning presenter Jenni Falconer in September 2019, referencing the 3am Girls, the Mirrorâs three gossip columnists.
There is an untidy boudoir of legal issues raised by an intimate relationship between a minister and someone in his department
Jolyon Maugham QC
Close friends and the Covid crisis
So how did Coladangelo go from selling sofas to solving the Covid crisis?
âI have over 20 yearsâ experience in business management and marketing and communications, with a focus on retail, healthcare, the third sector and energy,â Coladangelo wrote on her LinkedIn page, which charts her rise to the centre of Whitehall from director at Luther Pendragon, which claims to offer clients a âdeep understanding of the mechanics of governmentâ.
Alongside her day job for Oliver Bonas, the PR guru was taken on in an unpaid role alongside Hancock at the Department of Health and Social Care in March 2020, though questions have since been asked about exactly when she was hired. At a general election party in 2019, Coladangelo told the Standard she had started working for the then-health secretary in a comms role, helping out on his leadership campaign.
In September 2020, Hancock appointed her to the public payroll as a non-executive director, promoting her to the board that scrutinises the department and giving her unregulated access to the Palace of Westminster since April 2021.
When a Sunday paper asked in 2020 why Hancockâs âlobbyist palâ got a taxpayer-funded job, a department spokesman said her âadvice and expertiseâ were required as part of an âunprecedented response to this global pandemicâ.
There are no rules about who a government minister can hire, but âthere is an untidy boudoir of legal issues raised by an intimate relationship between a minister and someone in his department,â said Jolyon Maugham QC of The Good Law Project, who has investigated government contracts in the pandemic. âThe more serious issues resolve to a question of sequencing â where the relationship influenced the hiring choice, it is very likely to be unlawful.â
Inside Whitehall, âthere was never really much scepticism because she was very good at what she did,â a former government staffer said after the affair was exposed. âSheâd been with Mattâs team informally since his leadership election, so she wasnât this brand new person who came from nowhere.â The former colleague says the move was helped by the fact Coladangelo was a delight to work with.
âShe was always totally lovely, very friendly, bright, intelligent. She had those inclusive qualities â she was the sort of person who would always make everyone in the room feel like they were important. She always brought a nice level of positivity and enthusiasm to things, which is very welcome when youâre working on a pandemic.â
She was the sort of person who would always make everyone in the room feel like they were important
Tory sources say Coladangeloâs status in Whitehall was always âslightly mysteriousâ but she was in âevery meetingâ with Hancock. A source told a newspaper in 2020: âBefore Matt does anything big, heâll speak to Gina. She knows everything.â
Former colleagues say they were âsurprised but not shockedâ by news their relationship had turned romantic. âSomething obviously just changed,â a former staffer told the Evening Standard. âI had no idea something was going on, but theyâve always been incredibly close.â
Reports claim the romantic relationship only began six weeks before the footage of their kiss was revealed, but sources told the Mail on Sunday in the weeks that followed that the MP was already âin loveâ with his former aide.
Did Coladangelo feel the same way? Further inspection of her Pinterest quotes collection suggests she could have been: âI would rather die of passion than boredom,â reads a favourite Van Gogh quote. âLife is too short to wait,â reads another, while a third spells: âBe afraid and do it anywayâ. She certainly did that.
A brief spell in the shadows, then a rebrand (or several)
Running the London Marathon, speaking on the Steven Bartlett podcast, announcing heâs writing a new book: these are just some of the many attempts Hancock has had at a rebrand since his and Coladangeloâs affair was exposed 18 months ago. Was the Iâm A Celeb bombshell his final run at winning back (over?) the public â and did it work?
On entering, the former health secretary admitted part of the reason for the jungle stunt was that he didnât believe he would ever work in Goverment again, but others are sceptical. Some say heâs obsessed with public attention â last month, it also emerged he had skipped the Tory conference to film Channel Fourâs SAS Who Dares Wins alongside Pop Idol star Gareth Gates â while others believe itâs actually a money-making exercise after reports heâll earn £400,000 for his appearance on the ITV reality show (heâll probably be a lot poorer after the divorce settlement with Miller).
âHeâs got a skin as thick as a rhinoceros, quite frankly,â says Ian Houlder, a Conservative councillor on West Suffolk Council, adding that Hancock seems to have âno shameâ. But others consider his making it to the final a sign of success.
So was Coldangelo behind Hancockâs decision to run around an assault course in gold hotpants live on TV? Her history as his adviser, and the fact sheâs been so happy to be pictured by his side during many of his latest appearances, suggests she might be.
The pair kept a relatively low profile after the affair was first exposed, instead focusing on building their relationship behind closed doors. They were spotted on a romantic break in the Swiss Alps two months after being outed, with pictures showing him leaving the hotel in a baseball cap as they headed out to dinner with friends.
Since then, theyâve been seen holding hands at the Chelsea Flower Show in May, and were spotted shopping for rubbish bins at DIY store Homebase in Finchley, north London, four months ago, sparking rumours they might now be living together.
Matt Hancock x The Diary Of A CEO!
Matt Hancock stopped by with his new partner Gina to speak to me.
It’s time to find out what really happened, it’s time to ask the questions we’ve not had answers to; Party gate? Where did the CCTV footage come from? What mistakes did he make? pic.twitter.com/JVUiLpiDV0— Steven Bartlett (@SteveBartlettSC) February 14, 2022
Coladangelo left her job at the Department of Health and Social Care immediately after the affair was revealed, and reportedly separated from her husband. Her LinkedIn currently lists her as âmarketing and comms directorâ and a governor for two independent schools in London, Park House School and Tram House School, for children and young adults with autism.
âOver twenty yearsâ experience in business management and brand marketing & communications, with a particular focus on fast pace businesses and organisations,â she writes in her current LinkedIn bio. âStrong business leadership, focused on long term, sustainable growth. Excellent inter-personal skills, managing and inspiring large teams, coupled with extensive cross-discipline communications expertise. Significant experience in reputation and brand management, driven by clear commercial or public policy goals.â
Little else is known about Coladangeloâs current employment status but knowing that âbefore Matt does anything big, heâll speak to Ginaâ â is she the brains behind his most recent attempts to win over the public?
Recent months have seen the pair attempt further rebrands, including the announcement of a charity climb to the top of Mont Blanc in the French Alps in support of Cambridge Childrenâs Hospital.
âWe realised we had feelings for each other which were as strong as they were. It was very sudden and took us both by surprise,â Hancock writes in his extracts of his memoir published by the Daily Mail and Mail+ over the weekend, adding that he wants public forgiveness for breaking the rules, rather than his handling of the pandemic.
Insiders say there are rumours that he could be about to propose to Coladangelo â his next big stunt after the jungle and the book?