How did man of the people Nigel Farage get to use Blenheim Palace?

How did Nigel Farage get to use Blenheim Palace – Winston Churchill’s birthplace, a UNESCO World Heritage site and one of England’s largest houses – as the backdrop for his new year’s message?

The Reform leader recorded his speech – a typical slice of Trumpite bombasticism, largely about Nigel Farage – at the 18th-century country house at the back end of last year. But it’s likely the party was waived the usual room hire fee (Marlborough Room from £1,500 a day, Spencer Churchill Room from £850) given that Farage is pals with the 12th Duke of Marlborough, James Spencer-Churchill.

Spencer-Churchill, Winston’s first-cousin, three times removed, has heaped praise on Farage in the past, saying he “could end up in the same league” as the wartime leader and telling the Daily Telegraph: “Nigel Farage is doing the best job any man can do for his country and he is the only person who can stop this country being dragged into another war.”

The friendship, as well as the choice of venue, is yet another example of Farage’s ‘part of the establishment while pretending to be anti-establishment’ credentials. The Duke is not only a relative of Winston Churchill but the late Princess Diana, and is a descendant of the prominent US Vanderbilt family through his great-grandmother Consuelo Vanderbilt, a gilded age socialite.

Farage likes to refer to himself as leading the People’s Army. By his friends shall ye know him!

(Incidentally, Blenheim isn’t averse to taking the buck of those with a slightly different view of Britain’s relationship with the continent. Last year Keir Starmer hosted 50 leaders from across Europe there at a gathering of the European Political Community, where he reminded attendees Winston Churchill was among the chief architects of the European Convention on Human Rights.)