THE TELEGRAPH: Louis Theroux, the documentary-maker, has claimed he used to wake Nick Clegg up in the morning when they were at boarding school together.
The television presenter’s claim that he was the Liberal Democrat leader’s “fag” at Westminster School has led to renewed focus on the latter’s privileged upbringing.
Until recently, much had been made in the election campaign of David Cameron’s well-off family and his elite education at Eton and Oxford.
But Mr Clegg enjoyed an equally comfortable start in life, as the son of a successful banker, Nicholas Clegg, who is now chairman of United Trust Bank.
The MP’s maternal grandfather had been president of ABN, the Dutch bank. Despite this, Mr Clegg regularly criticises the “greedy” bankers who triggered the worldwide financial crisis and wants a 10 per cent tax on profits in the financial sector.
His paternal grandmother was Baroness Kira von Engelhardt, a descendant of an Attorney General in the Imperial Russian senate.
Mr Clegg grew up in the picturesque commuter town of Chalfont St Giles, Bucks, but his family also owns a large chalet in the Alps and a chateau in France.
He was sent to school at Westminster School in London where fees for boarders are now £28,344 a year.
One of his peers was Mr Theroux - best known for his BBC2 documentary series, Weird Weekends – who claims that he used to wait upon the politician every morning and bring him a newspaper.
Mr Theroux said that he had been Mr Clegg’s “fag”, in the old-fashioned system formerly widespread in public schools whereby younger pupils had to act as servants for older ones, waking him up in the morning during term time and presenting him with a newspaper.
Speaking on BBC’s The One Show on Friday night, Mr Theroux claimed: “People sleep in different ways and with Nick Clegg the thing was that he was a very deep sleeper. I would bend over him and kind of push him.”
But Mr Clegg said: “I have no recollection of Louis Theroux waking me up in the morning.” >>> | Monday, April 19, 2010
