Angela Rayner’s tax row has finally come to an end, as has her career.
Her reign as Deputy Prime Minister and Housing Secretary is over, triggering a frantic day of action in Westminster, which almost overshadowed the Reform UK conference.
But before we get stuck in, lets take you back to how this all began nearly two weeks ago, when both the Mail and the Sun on Sunday broke the story that Rayner, whilst cracking down on second home owners, had bought her second place but third home for £800,000 – a three bedroom seaside flat in Brighton.
According to Rayner, she was advised she would only need to pay the standard rate of tax on the purchase and denied any wrongdoing.
Nana Akua says Rayner’s downfall is her own making, calling out others for less while dodging
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But just days later, the Telegraph broke the news claiming that she had in fact, guess what? She had dodged £40,000 in stamp duty.
The Tories then wrote to the PM’s ethics adviser asking him to investigate Rayner’s tax affairs but she survived the weekend.
Now Angela would be the first to call out wrongdoing and demand resignations: “Now it emerged actually that that’s not true and that there was a HMRC investigation and that he’s had to pay penalties for that. I think that makes his position untenable.”
And her historic tweets show she’s called for other people to resign for much less.
Then, just half an hour before the first PMQs after summer recess, under fire Angela Rayner finally admitted that she had not payed enough tax on her second home, referring herself to ethics watchdog.
Oh, and the same Beth Rigby that hounded previous Conservative leaders to quit at every given opportunity, gave Rayner an easy ride.
The Cabinet rallied around, some more than others, including Lucy Powell, who by the way, she lost her job today as well.
Sir Keir repeatedly refused to say if he would sack Rayner if the standards adviser concluded she broke the ministerial code.
And meanwhile, Rayner’s property was targeted with graffiti, branding her a ‘tax evader’.
Then, this morning, the investigation found that she had breached the ministerial code because she had failed to meet the “highest possible standards of proper conduct”.
Ms Rayner resigned from all her positions, including Housing Secretary and deputy Labour leader. Then came the reshuffle. Brace yourselves…. because David Lammy is our new Deputy Prime Minister and Justice Minister.
Yvette Cooper has been taken out of the Home Office, and will replace Lammy, and Shabana Mahmood is the new Home Secretary.
Elsewhere, Steve Reed, Pat McFadden, Peter Kyle and Liz Kendall were given new posts. Ed Miliband, Bridget Phillipson and Wes Streeting stay where they are on this car crash of a day for Labour.
