Former deputy prime minister and housing minister Angela Rayner (Photo: UK Government)
Angela Rayner pledged to build 1.5 million houses. Her efforts to buy them has led to her downfall—and plunged the Labour government into chaos.
Rayner was forced to resign as housing secretary and deputy prime minister on Friday, forcing Keir Starmer to launch a re-shuffle.
Genocide supporter David Lammy has been appointed as the new deputy prime minister, in addition to being made justice secretary.
Yvette Cooper, as home secretary, has spent the last year clamping down on refugees. She’ll now spend her time making people into refugees in her new role as British foreign secretary.
She was under fire over banning Palestine Action, a non-violent direct action group, under the Terrorism Act 2000. Her draconian move provoked resistance and divisions inside the establishment.
Starmer has moved Cooper to take the heat off her, but she’ll be well-placed as foreign secretary to keep aiding and abetting genocide.
Shabana Mahmood becomes home secretary. As justice secretary, she spent her time legitimising the far right conspiracy theory of “two-tier policing”—the idea that the police go harder after white people.
Mahmood is known as a right wing hardliner on immigration and will continue Cooper’s strategy of trying to “out-racist” Reform UK.
Ian Murray, famous for dressing in a Union Flag suit, is disappointed that he’s been sacked as Scottish secretary.
Lucy Powell spent her time as leader of the House of Commons in obscurity—now she goes on to further obscurity on the back benches. And Steve Reed takes over as housing secretary.
Welfare slasher Liz Kendall, who suffered a humiliating U-turn over “reforms” to disabled people’s benefits, has been moved to science secretary.
The old Blairite, Pat McFadden, takes over as work and pensions secretary.
Another ghost of the Blair years returns—Douglas Alexander as Scottish secretary.
The reshuffle represents a further shift rightwards.
Rayner used £160,000 from a trust set up to care for her disabled son to buy an £800,000 second home—and dodged a £40,000 tax bill.
The second house, a seafront flat in Brighton and Hove, is worth £800,000. This means she should have paid £70,000 in stamp duty, but dodged more than half of the tax bill by listing the flat as her primary residence.
Rayner hoped she could perform this accounting trick because she’d transferred ownership of her first property, a house in Greater Manchester, to her son’s trust. But, as her son is under 18, the trust is legally owned by Rayner and her ex-husband and the Manchester property is her primary residence.
Rayner blamed the “error” on tax advice that didn’t “properly take account” of these complications. She referred herself to the ministerial standards committee—after she was exposed.
Rayner doesn’t stand alone—Labour is a party full of hypocrites. Former homelessness minister and landlord Rushanara Ali was forced to resign over making people homeless.
Former anti-corruption minister Tulip Siddiq was in hot water over corruption. She used her family ties to former Bangladeshi dictator Sheikh Hasina to get hold of lucrative state-owned land.
And east London MP Jas Athwal, the biggest landlord in the House of Commons, was exposed as a slum landlord.
This all makes Labour’s commitment to “prevent private renters being exploited and discriminated against” ring a little hollow.
Rayner’s hypocrisy came under intense fire from the right. Tory leader Kemi Badenoch and Nigel Farage jumped on board, with the Reform UK leader saying, “I don’t see how Angela Rayner can survive this.”
And vile graffiti of “Tax evader Rayner” and “b***h” were seen outside her new house in Hove.
This meant that some on the soft left tried to defend Rayner, claiming her working class background and disabled son should shield her from criticism.
Rayner was in the Starmer cabinet to give “working class” cover to right wing policies, much like John Prescott in the Blair governments.
The former trade union shop steward ended up known as “two jags Prescott” for his lavish and corrupt lifestyle.
Another former shop steward turned Labour sellout can now claim “two flats Rayner” as her nickname.
Rayner claimed her housing manoeuvres were to ensure her disabled son “continued to have stability in the family home”.
But Rayner voted to slash the benefits of disabled people across Britain. What about their “stability”?
No one on the left should be lining up behind Rayner—or let the right pose the opposition to this corrupt and hated Labour government.
Rayner is far from the only hypocrite in the Labour Party. But the departure of the deputy prime minister, and housing minister, for a housing scandal is a bad look for Starmer’s ailing Labour.
Starmer is in trouble from scandals and betrayals to the proscription of Palestine Action.
As he reshuffles the cabinet, the left’s job is to build a fightback that will make it shuffle off into the dustbin.
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