Marie-France van Heel

Van Heel was born in January 1970 to Dutch parents.^[1][2] She was born in Roslyn, Pennsylvania, US.^[2] As a child, Van Heel lived in the Netherlands and Belgium.^[3] In the late 1980s, she moved to the United Kingdom to study English at the University of Cambridge.^[2][4]

Van Heel met Andy Burnham at the university. In January 1992, while in a relationship with Burnham and with his consent, she appeared on Blind Date, where she went on a blind date with Will Harris, who went on to become marketing director of the Conservative Party.^[5][6]

After graduating from the University of Cambridge, van Heel worked in various roles in marketing across a variety of companies. She worked at Sky and was among the team that worked on the logo designs for the BBC and England Rugby.^[1] Van Heel worked for three years at her own firm, MVH Marketing, before dissolving it in 2011.^[7] She became chief strategy officer for London-based campaign designer Heavenly in 2022, joined the board of directors of Manchester-based electric vehicle charging network Be.EV in 2024,^[8] and became chief marketing officer of the latter's parent firm Iduna Infrastructure.^[4][9]

At the time of Burnham's 2026 Labour Party leadership election campaign, she was sitting on the board of humanitarian organisation Plan International. With them, she had worked with Marie Curie, Alzheimer's Society, Great Ormond Street Hospital, and Guy's & St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust.^[4][10]

Van Heel and Burnham married in 2000,^[11] and have a son and two daughters.^[8][12][13] Van Heel joined Burnham for his 2015 Labour Party leadership election campaign but subsequently avoided the public eye.^[8]