Angela Rayner, a 46-year-old MP and former deputy prime minister, has been cleared of impropriety by HMRC over her failure to pay tens of thousands of pounds in stamp duty on her luxury flat in Hove, East Sussex. However, her suitability for high office is questioned due to doubts about her intellect and self-control, as well as her controversial lifestyle.
If Angela Rayner is to be believed, she waited a surprisingly long time to tell the world about her strikingly convenient letter from HMRC confirming she had been ‘cleared’ of impropriety over her failure to pay tens of thousands of pounds in stamp duty on her luxury flat in Hove, East Sussex.
The letter, she has suggested, arrived on Tuesday – helpfully clearing the dark clouds of the tax investigation that had been hanging over her since September last year. Tuesday, of course, was the day rebellious ministers were resigning and dozens of MPs were calling on Sir Keir Starmer to go. You might imagine that Ms Rayner, 46, would have immediately wanted to release this revelation to the media, given her well-publicised ambition to become prime minister herself. Not so.
Nor did she tell the world on Wednesday, when Parliament was full for the King’s Speech, and the news subsequently broke that Wes Streeting was ‘preparing’ to run for the Labour leadership. It was only yesterday morning, after it had become clear Mr Streeting was on the verge of resigning, that Team Rayner offered exclusive interviews to ITV and The Guardian revealing HMRC had cleared her of ‘deliberate wrongdoing’ or ‘carelessness’ over her failure to fork out the £40,000 duty on the £800,000 pad.
Team Rayner – which is led by her partner, hard-Left former Labour MP Sam Tarry, 43 – stipulated that the information went live at 6am. Why? So the story would divert attention from any statement Mr Streeting might put out. Ms Rayner has not published the correspondence from HMRC, although the BBC claims it has seen an email to her lawyers allegedly verifying the matter is closed.
Yet the chaotic state of her finances is not the only reason for doubting Ms Rayner’s suitability for high office. Indeed, given that she has repeatedly sparked fears she has neither the intellect nor the self-control necessary to lead the nation, critics insist that the idea Ms Rayner can tout herself as a prime minister-in-waiting defies belief.
It was only after it had become clear Wes Streeting was on the verge of resigning, that Team Rayner offered exclusive interviews revealing she had been 'cleared' of impropriety by HMRC. Angela Rayner failed to pay tens of thousands of pounds in stamp duty on her luxury flat in Hove, East Sussex.
She tends to dismiss attacks on her intellect and prefers to make a virtue of her inspirational backstory, which saw her brought up in poverty on a council estate, leaving school at 16 while pregnant and with no qualifications, before rising to become deputy prime minister. Yet only last month, her behaviour in the House of Commons’ Strangers’ Bar one Monday evening shocked and appalled fellow MPs.
The Daily Mail disclosed how she got involved in a heated debate with a group of fellow drinkers and was heard shouting: ‘I’m a socialist. ’ Onlookers were said to have been left ‘open-mouthed’ at the sight of a former deputy prime minister so clearly the worse for wear, with some witnesses claiming she was ‘trolleyed’, while one in the bar described her as ‘absolutely obliterated’.
As she left, Ms Rayner collided with the door – the force of the impact leaving her bent over. While the door was removed for repairs the very next day, parliamentary officials said this move wasn’t linked to the incident. Naturally, Ms Rayner’s office denied she was drunk and disorderly, claiming the report was ‘a concoction of mischief-making’. But this incident is by no means a one-off.
Her lifestyle has long attracted controversy, not least when, as deputy PM, she lived in a grace-and-favour apartment in Admiralty House in Whitehall once occupied by Sir Winston Churchill and her political hero John Prescott, Tony Blair’s deputy prime minister. The parties she held there, to a soundtrack of booming house music, have entered political folklore.
A notorious party animal, Ms Rayner even has a signature cocktail, which she has christened Venom, that consists of a bottle of vodka, a bottle of Southern Comfort, ten bottles of Blue WKD and a litre of orange juice. At one party, a male Labour councillor drank so much of it that he was later found fast asleep in a dog basket.
While most ministers would seek to play down any idea that they are politics’ answer to notorious hell-raising actor Oliver Reed, Ms Rayner appears to revel in her image. In 2023, she revealed that when she went to the supermarket often the only items in her basket were vapes and bottles of wine. That same year she went on a holiday in Spain where she partied round-the-clock.
‘The girls I was raving with are half my age, and I was like a grandma,’ she recalled. ‘I was proud of that. I started at 4pm and I got home at six o’clock in the morning when the sun was shining and I was like: “Yes, I can do it
Angela Rayner HMRC Stamp Duty Luxury Flat Impropriety Doubt Intellect Self-Control Lifestyle Party Animal Signature Cocktail Oliver Reed Spain Rave Grandmother Vapes Wine Supermarket Grace-And-Favour Apartment Admiralty House Strangers’ Bar Monday Evening Drunk And Disorderly Collided With The Door Parliamentary Officials Office Concoction Of Mischief-Making Party Booming House Music Dog Basket Vape Wine Supermarket Grace-And-Favour Apartment Admiralty House Strangers’ Bar Monday Evening Drunk And Disorderly Collided With The Door Parliamentary Officials Office Concoction Of Mischief-Making
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Angela Rayner Accuses Starmer of Making Mistakes, Hints at Leadership BidAngela Rayner, a Labour MP, has accused Keir Starmer of making mistakes and suggested he should reflect on whether to resign. She has also claimed that she will not run with her friend Andy Burnham and has settled a £40,000 stamp duty dispute with HMRC. Meanwhile, Health Secretary Wes Streeting prepares to resign and launch his own leadership bid, and Ed Miliband is rumoured to be running.
Read more »
Angela Rayner Cleared of Deliberate Wrongdoing, Paves Way for Leadership Bid Amid Starmer UncertaintyAngela Rayner, the MP for Ashton-under-Lyne, has been cleared of deliberate wrongdoing in an investigation over her tax affairs, paving the way for a potential leadership bid amid uncertainty over Sir Keir Starmer's future. As Health Secretary Wes Streeting mulls whether to launch a challenge to the Prime Minister, Sir Keir's former deputy did not rule out running in any race but said she would not 'trigger' a contest.
Read more »
Satirical Comparison: Lucy Punch's Amandaland and the Political Persona of Angela RaynerAn exploration of the parallels between the delusional influencer character in the Bafta-winning series Amandaland and the public image of Labour politician Angela Rayner.
Read more »
Angela Rayner Cleared of Tax Evasion by HMRCLabour's ex-deputy leader Angela Rayner has been exonerated by HMRC of the accusation that she deliberately sought to avoid tax over the purchase of a home in Hove, East Sussex. She was required to pay £40,000 in unpaid stamp duty but was said to have avoided a fine.
Read more »