Dorneywood

Dorneywood is an eighteenth-century house near Burnham in the South Bucks District of Buckinghamshire, England. Originally a Georgian farmhouse, it has Victorian and later additions, and was rebuilt after a fire in 1910. It was given to the National Trust by Lord Courtauld-Thomson in 1947 as a country home for a senior member of the Government, usually a Secretary of State or Minister of the Crown. The Dorneywood Trust has the objective of 'maintaining the mansion house and gardens of Dorneywood'.

The Prime Minister alone decides which Minister or Secretary of State is to occupy the house. In previous administrations it has been the residence of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and, prior to 31 May 2006, was occupied by Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott. Prescott was forced to relinquish occupancy of Dorneywood, following a series of scandals over an affair with civil servant Tracey Temple and a snatched paparazzi photograph of him playing croquet on the lawn of the property whilst the Prime Minister Tony Blair was out of the country on a visit to Washington. However, given the controversies over John Prescott's use of the house, senior politicians were reluctant to use it. The house was eventually taken over by Alistair Darling, Chancellor of the Exchequer when Gordon Brown became Prime Minister in 2007. "A spokesman for Mr Brown ... explained that the house ... was owned by a trust, and would revert first to the Lord Mayor of London and then to the American Ambassador, if the Chancellor did not want it".

...
Wikipedia