Akshata Murty, wife of former prime minister Rishi Sunak, said the couple and their two daughters feel like they belong in North Yorkshire, where Mr Sunak is the Conservative MP for Richmond and Northallerton.
Speaking at Richmond Castle, Ms Murty said: “We’ve been living here now for 11 years… We feel incredibly lucky to live here, incredibly accepted in this community, incredibly proud in Rishi’s case, to represent this community.”
Family ties to Yorkshire
Ms Murty added: “Our children… I think if you wake them up in the middle of the night, they’ll tell you they’re Yorkshiremen, and feel truly at home. And so I think we just feel like we belong here.”
Her comments came as The Richmond Project, the numeracy skills charity founded by the couple, launched a new guide for the summer holidays to encourage families to explore numbers on their days out.
New numeracy guide
The online resource features some of the couple’s favourite family destinations and includes six guides for attractions in London, aiming to encourage families to spot everyday numbers in exhibits and spaces, from counting the windows of an old castle to the length of a blue whale.
The latest addition has been Richmond Castle, which is run by English Heritage in Richmond, North Yorkshire.
Ms Murty said: “You have young kids, and you think, how do I entertain them for the summer? We developed a guide to some of London’s biggest attractions, but also to parks and streets, so even if you don’t live near a big museum, you can still practice your number adventures over the summer holidays.”
Charity’s mission
Ms Murty said the couple wanted to show families how numbers can be “fun and accessible outside the classroom” through their charity.
She said: “Rishi and I really believe in the power of education to transform people’s lives. And that happens in a few different ways. We think numeracy skills alongside literacy skills, for example, are some of the building blocks that we all need to access life meaningfully.”
Ms Murty added: “I think there are so many of us, young and old, across the country who have a certain anxiety with numbers. And we want to help bring about a change in that. We want to show that we can demystify numbers and do that in a way where people can use number skills in more aspects of their lives.”
