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 constituency retreat in the rolling countryside of North . Their Georgian country , 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 – 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- barbecue, where Rishi likes to wield the tongs. ‘When Rishi became chancellor, she [Akshata] was worried that the family would be 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 communications for the Treasury under Sunak, and l.
