Kiwi busted with Churchill's kin

A New Zealand man is in a Sydney jail after being arrested with Sir Winston Churchill's great-grandson during a major Ecstasy bust.

Rees Gerard Woodgate is believed to be in Sydney's Parklea jail on drug trafficking charges after being arrested in June with Nicholas Jake Gompo Barton, the great-grandson of the British wartime leader.

It is not known how long the 42-year-old Woodgate had been in Australia but he was reportedly living in Bondi Junction at the time of the arrest.

A report in the Sunday Telegraph said Woodgate and Barton were charged with supplying a commercial quantity of Ecstasy after police seized about A$12.5 million-worth of tablets during raids on their homes.

Police, who conducted the raids after a three-month investigation, also found 18kg of Ecstasy powder, two pill presses and more than A$100,000 in cash.

The Ecstasy tablets were reported to carry logos of various car manufacturers including Maserati, Mercedes Benz and Volkswagen.

The Sunday Telegraph said neither man had entered a plea.

Despite the arrests occurring in June, Barton's family history appears to have been discovered only after the 33-year-old appeared by video-link in court last week.

He had been applying for bail but it was refused and his case was adjourned until November.

Barton's mother is Arabella Spencer Churchill, the granddaughter of Sir Winston, the British Prime Minister during World War II.

Sir Winston was the 1953 winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature for his many books on English and world history.

In the 2002 BBC poll the 100 Greatest Britons he was voted the Greatest-ever Briton.