It would be putting it mildly to say that Angela Rayner has had better weeks in politics. The Deputy Prime Minister has been in the spotlight over the last few days after admitting on Wednesday that she had underpaid stamp duty on her third property. While Prime Minister Keir Starmer gave a spirited defence of his second-in-command in PMQs, a number of her lefty colleagues are turning against her over the tax affair mess. One Labour MP remarked to the Telegraph: ‘She said she had thought about resigning, and she should give that some more thought now.’ Ouch.
But it’s not all bad. The palaver could lead to an unlikely alliance: between the deputy Labour leader and the TaxPayers’ Alliance. The organisation has written to Rayner amid her housing scandal, inviting the Red Queen to join their campaign to stamp out stamp duty. Head of campaigns Elliot Keck has encouraged the beleaguered Ashton-under-Lyne MP to back the crusade after her own run-in with HMRC, claiming the limiting of her liabilities was ‘completely understandable’. He noted effusively that Rayner would be ‘adding her voice to a movement that speaks to ordinary taxpayers up and down the county who are fed up with being punished for truing to get on and provide for their families’. Keck went on:
You’ve had direct experience of just how unfair and convoluted our tax system can be. By setting up a trust for your children you were likely just doing what families up and down the country do all the time in arranging their affairs in a way that ensures their hard-earned wealth goes to their children, not to the state. A perfect example of how someone is forced into complicated arrangements just to do right by their families. It’s exactly this kind of complexity and injustice that we exist to challenge.
It’s time for a simpler, fairer tax system that gives taxpayers, including yourself, a much-needed break. This should include as an absolute priority the abolition of both stamp duty and inheritance tax.
Sounds just the type of campaign Rayner could get behind, eh?
It’s a rare friendly face at a difficult time, but will the deputy Labour leader accept the olive branch? Don’t hold your breath…
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