Dame Cherie? Nonsense, says Downing Street

The Mail on Sunday was informed by a well-placed source that confidential talks on whether Mrs Blair should receive a damehood had taken place in the highly secretive "honours secretariat" inside the Cabinet Office.

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According to the source, officials were alarmed by a suggestion that Mrs Blair could get the highest form of damehood – a Dame Grand Cross of the British Empire (known as a GBE) – as she had served nearly twice as long in No10 as John Major's wife, Norma, who received a conventional damehood.

It would put Mrs Blair on a par with Winston Churchill's wife Clementine, who was granted the rare GBE in 1946, a year after her husband won the Second World War.

The source also claimed that Mr Blair was planning to award gongs to a number of aides. Asked if Mrs Blair were to be made a Dame, a Cabinet Office spokesman said:

"We do not comment on individual cases and we do not recognise this story."

Downing Street insisted there was no truth in the claim and described it as "nonsense". Asked if Mrs Blair, who is known for her Republican views, would accept a damehood, her spokeswoman said: "One has not been offered so it does not arise."

But a senior official involved in the honours process said: "The idea of Mrs Blair being made a Dame has been aired in the honours secretariat. Some feel it could be inappropriate."

By tradition, outgoing Prime Ministers are allowed to award gongs to personal and political allies in a resignation honours list on leaving No10.

In 1976 there was uproar over Harold Wilson's list after strenuously denied claims that awards for his cronies were influenced by his formidable assistant Marcia Falkender, who became a Baroness.

Downing Street refused even to say if Mr Blair planned to issue his own list of resignation honours.

Prime Ministerial spouses are often among the recipients of such awards, but some have left with nothing. Others have been honoured years later.

Norma Major was made a Dame by the Queen in 1999, partly for her charity work for Mencap, two years after husband John stepped down as PM. Denis Thatcher received an hereditary baronetcy in Margaret Thatcher's list in 1990.

James Callaghan's wife Audrey became Lady Callaghan, but not until 1987 when her husband became a peer eight years after Mrs Thatcher defeated him.