Board a Friday afternoon train from Kings Cross to Darlington and you might find yourself sitting opposite a petite woman in her early forties, her black hair in a ponytail and tucked under a low-peaked baseball cap, coaxing her two daughters to get on with their homework at the table in a standard-class carriage. It might turn out to be Akshata Murty, the enigmatic wife of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak; Britain’s ‘First Lady’, on her way to the family’s Richmond constituency retreat in the rolling countryside of North Yorkshire. Their Georgian country house, Kirby Sigston Manor, was acquired for a relatively modest £1.
5 million and has proved itself, say friends, to be a shelter from the rough and tumble of politics – as well as something of a money pit: renovations are rumoured to have cost £400,000 for a swimming pool, gym and a garden with a state-of-the-art barbecue, where Rishi likes to wield the tongs. ‘When Rishi became chancellor, she [Akshata] was worried that the family would be living in a goldfish bowl. But she’s not easily put off,’ says Jennie Tillotson, a constituency stalwart who has spent days ‘pounding the streets’ on the campaign trail with the couple and their families.
‘They are very well-liked around here and no one cares how wealthy they are – they’re at home and very much part of the place,’ she adds. ‘Yorkshire has looked after Akshata,’ confides Allegra Stratton, the political journalist, who worked as head of communic.