Lotto winner who can teach Tamara the true spirit of Christmas

WE ALL worry about breakins at this time of year. The notion of some ne’er- do-well making off with Christmas while you’re at Midnight Mass is one that’s crossed all our minds.

Most of us just buy one of those plug-in lamp timers and ask the neighbours to keep an eye out.

If you’re Tamara Ecclestone, squillionare daughter of Formula One Bernie, the stakes are a little higher. You live in a £70 million mansion in Kensington with a gigantic Santa sleigh attached to the front, so many fairy lights it’s practically visible from space — and £50 million worth of jewellery in the safe (or so we’re told).

The kind of people who are going to take an interest in you are not going to be put off by a little electrical tomfoolery. And so you have round-the-clock security and the place is bristling with alarms and cameras.

But still, it doesn’t stop someone breaking in and stealing the lot while you’re off in Lapland (via private jet) with the fam.

Poor Tamara. It really can’t be easy being that rich. I don’t mean to be rude, really I don’t, and of course I feel sympathy for her; but what on earth was she thinking?

Quite apart from the fact that no one — not even the Queen — keeps that much bling at home, why would anyone need that amount of jewellery in the first place?

EVEN for a woman whose style is probably best described as ‘disco-ball chic’, who needs — or wants — the financial equivalent of a stately home dangling around their neck? Or two small private jets pinned to their ears?

Talking of which, here’s the silly part. Shortly before the robbery happened, she posted a picture on Instagram of her five-year- old daughter, Sophie, boarding the plane to Lapland. Why not just erect a big sign on the front of the house saying ‘ all- you- can- nick priceless jewel buffet this way’?

Tamara’s social media feed is one endless VDW (vulgar display of wealth). Apart from attracting undesirable attention, it sends the wrong message about Christmas — which is supposed to be about generosity, the kind that comes from the heart, not the wallet.

Down in the pretty but modest seaside town of Selsey, West Sussex, that spirit is alive and well, and very likely sneaking a quick fag before unloading the latest pallet of bricks from the back of his old yellow van.

Steve Thomson, a builder who last month won £105 million on the Lottery, has gone back to work part-time, promising to finish his customers’ jobs before next week — for free.

He wants them to keep the money for Christmas presents. He has said the win has been an ‘emotional rollercoaster’ and work is helping keep his feet on the ground.

‘I feel normal, and that’s how I want to stay,’ he said. ‘I’m trying to finish some jobs before Christmas. I’m doing as many as I can.’

So this really is a tale of two Christmasses. On the one hand, a woman who spends her days and the fruits of Daddy’s labours turning her home into the equivalent of a giant snow globe before rubbing everyone’s noses in it on Instagram; who ‘shares’ but doesn’t really share at all.

On the other a man who could also be flying his family to Lapland on a private jet, but instead goes out of his way to spread joy throughout his local community.

Both of these people owe their fortunes to luck. But I think only one of them truly deserves it.