Rachel Reeves will get the keys to authorities’s plush
She enjoyed raving on the Spanish island of Ibiza, but Angela Rayner is unlikely to be able to hold any country house parties.
For the Daily Mail understands that Dorneywood, a 21-room grace-and-favour mansion, has been given not to Ms Rayner, the Deputy Prime Minister, but to Rachel Reeves, the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
It is a blow to Ms Rayner as the last Labour deputy prime minister, John Prescott, was handed rent-free use of the 18th-century home instead of the then chancellor, Gordon Brown.
The official website of Dorneywood, which was given to the nation by the industrialist Lord Courtauld-Thomson in 1947 as a country home for a senior member of the government, has quietly confirmed that Ms Reeves is the new occupant.
On the page for the property – which is set in 200 acres of Buckinghamshire countryside – it states: ‘July 2024 to present: Rachel Reeves, Chancellor of the Exchequer.’
The official website of Dorneywood (pictured) has quietly confirmed that Ms Reeves is the new occupant
Rachel Reeves (pictured), the Chancellor of the Exchequer, has been given Dorneywood, a 21-room grace-and-favour mansion
The Deputy PM enjoyed raving on the Spanish island of Ibiza (pictured), but Angela Rayner is unlikely to be able to hold any country house parties
Sources say that Sue Gray (pictured), Sir Keir’s chief of staff, has sent them to work instead for the PM’s enforcer, Pat McFadden
Ms Rayner is said to enjoy styling herself as ‘Prescott in a skirt’, in emulation of her plain-speaking predecessor. However, Lord Prescott occupied a formal Office of the Deputy Prime Minister with its own dedicated staff.
The Mail on Sunday reported at the weekend that the Civil Service’s preparations for a Keir Starmer government included a plan for Ms Rayner, who is also the Housing Secretary, to control a similar operation, which was to be allocated two private secretaries with security clearance to operate at the highest level of government.
But sources say that Sue Gray, Sir Keir’s chief of staff, has sent them to work instead for the PM’s enforcer, Pat McFadden, the increasingly powerful Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.
And Ms Rayner angrily denied that she occupies her title in name only after Ms Reeves persuaded the Prime Minister that Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds should take a prominent role in the Deputy PM’s ‘red revolution’ on employment laws.
Ms Rayner insists she has been attending powerful meetings of Starmer’s top team and doing ‘unsexy’ work on big policy areas. No 10 did not respond to a request for comment.
