Britain's 'first gay dad' is splurging MILLIONS on his eight children this Christmas - including purchasing a £600,000 flat for his baby.
Barrie Drewitt-Barlow, 52, is originally from Manchester, but now owns homes across the globe including in Florida and Essex. Barrie and ex-husband Tony were the first gay couple in the UK to have a child via surrogacy and are planning a flamboyant occasion this Christmas.
The blowout will include buying gifts for his now fiancé Scott, a £600,000 flat for his baby Romeo in Manchester complete with a designer wardrobe - even a Rolls Royce fitted with a specially designed booster seat to take him to nursery.
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Daughter Valetina, two, will be gifted with a purpose built playground at their Essex home with Saffron also reportedly set to get a new £275,000 Lamborghini Uris - but the other children won't go without either.
Speaking to the Manchester Evening News from his home in Florida, Barrie, said: "Christmas is one of those times when it's nice to splash out on your family. I know there are many families that will not be so lucky this year for sure.
"I feel for them all. Sometimes people read things that are just over exaggerated and think that we are just rich snobs who have never had hardship or we were born with a silver spoon in our mouths.
"This is just not the case at all. Everyone gives their children what they can afford. Gay or straight. Remember, I was born to very poor parents, in a council house in Longsight. Nobody handed me anything.
"When I met Tony, he was living in a council house in Wythenshawe. We worked hard and make some money and now we want to spend our money on our kids. I just don’t understand people's interest - if I was reading a paper and saw someone buying a Rolex for their son, I'd be thinking 'well done'."
But Barrie isn't bothered about what people think of his splurge, adding: "People can think what the hell they like, they always do anyway. It's my money - I work up to 20 hours a day some days and now I want to buy things for my kids. I really couldn’t give a flying f*** what anyone thinks."
The multi-millionaire, who owns the British Surrogacy Centre agency, split from husband Tony in 2019 and is now engaged to Scott, who previously dated his daughter Saffron. However, they all share a £10million home in Florida in order to co-parent, with Tony and partner Brent living in the north wing, and Barrie and Scott in the west wing.
Barrie and Tony first made history back in 1999 when they became the first British same-sex couple to be legally recognised as parents, after twins Saffron and Aspen, now 22, were born through surrogacy. They later had Orlando, 18, then twins Jasper and Dallas, 11. With Scott, Barrie has had Valentina, two, and baby Romeo aged five-months. Barrie also has a son called Colin from a previous relationship.
Barrie and Tony, who are worth an estimated £175m thanks to their medical company Princeton Consumer Research, went to court after their eldest children Saffron and Aspen were born, winning the right to be named as 'parent one' and 'parent two' instead of mother and father on the birth certificate.
"My previous partner (Tony) and I met in 1987, we have always been in each others lives since that day to this. We decided when our relationship had come to an end that we would always be best friends and be there for each other," Barrie added.
"We decided that he would have the north wing with his new partner and me the west wing with mine and our children. We live with all the children coming and going.
"When we first wanted to have children, it was 1996, I was working as a social worker in Essex and London, and thought it would be great to adopt or foster with my partner Tony. In those days, two people of the same sex could not make an application together and to be honest, it was never even thought of as an option for gays.
"After some searching and looking into alternatives, I decided that Tony and I were going to go to America and look at this thing childless couple were doing, called surrogacy. I had no idea what it was only that you could buy an egg from a woman, fertilize it and then another woman would carry it for you, for a fee.
"So, we did this and never looked back. Dec 1999, 23 years ago this month, our beautiful biological twins were born, Aspen and Saffron. This was the best Christmas of our lives.
"Of course this caused drama all over the world, 'gay men having babies.' We rode the negative press for few years and decided early on that we were the whipping boys for same sex parenting. But, the negative press became positive and as more and more gay men, and famous gay men, became parents through surrogacy, public opinion changed."
They will be spending Christmas overseas in the states this year, but Barrie says he misses the festivities in the UK. He added: "I have lived all over the USA, and we have property all over, but to be honest, I love Florida. We have a house in Tampa, close by to my office and a beach house on Miami Beach where we go to escape and chill out.
"Christmas is strange as hell in Florida - it's hot as hell all year round, compared to Manchester anyway. I would much rather be at the house in Essex over Christmas to be honest with you.
"Our main business is clinical research. We provide human clinical trials for big pharma and cosmetic companies all over the world. We recently, in the past year, opened up a clinical site on Plymouth Road, Ardwick Manchester. Manchester has always felt like home to us. We always say you can take the boy out of Manchester but you cannot take Manchester out of the boy."
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