Perk of the job ...is it going to be Three Homes Rayner next?
ANGELA RAYNER once described herself as ‘John Prescott in a skirt’ and was presumptuously billed as ‘shadow deputy prime minister’ when she recently wrote a column in a Labour-supporting newspaper.
But if she does become Labour’s first ‘DPM’ since Lord Prescott, will she also be granted the perk of Dorneywood – the 18th-century house in Buckinghamshire where Prescott infamously enjoyed a game of croquet when running the country in Tony Blair’s absence?
One person likely to have a view is Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves, given that use of the house is traditionally gifted by the prime minister to the chancellor.
Lord Prescott was granted use of the house because the then chancellor, Gordon Brown, felt uncomfortable with the country squire image it conveyed.
If Ms Reeves follows suit, or agrees to share it, Ms Rayner would be in the enviable position of having three homes at her disposal, in addition to the properties she has in London and her Ashton-under-Lyne constituency.
The grace-and-favour government homes have been the subject of undignified squabbles in the past, with prime ministers frequently having to broker houseshare arrangements.
Prime ministers have automatic use of 16th-century Chequers in Buckinghamshire.
When Nick Clegg was deputy prime minister, during the Coalition Government, he shared Chevening, a 115-room mansion in Kent, with foreign secretary William Hague.
Similarly, when Liz Truss was Boris Johnson’s foreign secretary, she had to share Chevening with her predecessor Dominic Raab, after Mr Johnson offered him the house to soften the blow of demoting him to justice secretary.
As she has revealed in her book, Ten Years To Save The West, which is being serialised in the Daily Mail and The Mail on Sunday, Ms Truss ‘had a battle to get my hands on Chevening’ because Mr Raab had been offered sole use of the property. She wrote: ‘Eventually, a compromise was reached: Raab and I would have access to Chevening on a timeshare basis.
‘It was like an exalted student flat-share. I’d arrive for the weekend and find protein shakes labelled “Raab” in the fridge.’
The situation was even more complicated when Theresa May was resident in Downing Street. Mr Johnson, then foreign secretary, Brexit secretary David Davis and international trade secretary Liam Fox all had to share the manor house.
When Geoffrey Howe was removed as foreign secretary by Margaret Thatcher in 1989, his bitterness at leaving Chevening is said to have contributed to the devastating resignation statement he gave in the Commons a year later, which set events in motion towards the end of Thatcher’s premiership.
Dorneywood has traditionally been at the disposal of the chancellor since it was gifted to the National Trust in 1947.
Lord Prescott, 85, gave up use of the house after the MoS published the croquet pictures. It was used by Alistair Darling after Mr Brown became prime minister in 2007.
A Labour spokesman declined to comment last night.