That is indeed a strange mix. Start probing Tesssa Jowell's family connections and it starts to get really incestous.

Tessa Blackstone, incidentally, is just one of dozens of unelected ordinary proles, elevated to the peerage so that they could take on government jobs - the hundreds of elected Labour MPs available to him not apparently allowing President Blair quite enough choice. The existence of all these placepeople in the upper house helps ensure that nothing passes through the House of Lords without Blair's say so.