Delegates for a private conference of top politicians and businesspeople from around the world have started to arrive at a luxury country hotel.

Several cars with blacked-out windows entered the gates of the Grove hotel, near Watford, Hertfordshire, on Thursday morning for the secretive meeting of the Bilderberg Group.

It is thought billionaire executives from multinational companies such as Amazon and Google, high-ranking political figures including the chancellor, George Osborne, and even members of royal families are among the 130 or so attendees.

Amid tight security, members of the press and a handful of protesters gathered in a fenced-off area just inside the grounds of the hotel, but some half a mile from the redbrick hotel.

As delegates arrived for the four-day meeting, protesters heckled their cars as they disappeared down the driveway.