Angela Rayner will leave the Government, after an independent ethics probe into the Deputy Prime Minister’s tax affairs reported back. It comes as lawyers she blamed for her stamp duty underpayment denied having given her tax advice.
Rayner has told the Prime Minister in a letter that “I deeply regret my decision to not seek additional specialist tax advice” and took “full responsibility for this error” as she resigned as Deputy Prime Minister, Housing Secretary and deputy leader of the Labour Party.
Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner is expected to leave Government following an investigation into her tax affairs by Sir Keir Starmer’s independent standards adviser, it is understood. The Prime Minister received the report by ethics watchdog Sir Laurie Magnus on Wednesday morning.
The Deputy Prime Minister has faced mounting pressure to stand down over recent days after admitting she underpaid stamp duty on a flat she bought in Hove earlier this year. Ms Rayner, who is also the Housing Secretary, paid £40,000 less of the surcharge on the property than she should have, as she claimed it was her main home rather than a second home.
Ethics watchdog Sir Laurie Magnus said Angela Rayner had “acted with integrity and with a dedicated and exemplary commitment to public service” but concluded she breached the ministerial code over her tax affairs. Sir Laurie Magnus found that Angela Rayner “did not heed the caution” in legal advice she received when buying her Hove flat.
The independent ethics adviser said in his letter: “She believed that she relied on the legal advice she had received, but unfortunately did not heed the caution contained within it, which acknowledged that it did not constitute expert tax advice and which suggested that expert advice be sought.
“I am conscious of the acute challenges ministers face – perhaps uniquely – in managing the demands of their personal lives and their public responsibilities. However, the responsibility of any taxpayer for reporting their tax returns and settling their liabilities rests ultimately with themselves.”
Downing Street said Sir Keir Starmer had taken “a number of steps” to strengthen the ministerial code and ensure investigations into misconduct can take place.
A No 10 spokesman said: “The PM has insisted that if there are issues ministers must refer themselves to the independent adviser.”
The spokesman said these changes were designed to “strengthen the process around the independent adviser’s role”.
Ms Rayner’s colleagues in Government had lined up to defend her record, with trade minister Douglas Alexander on Friday morning telling Times Radio she was in politics “for the right reasons”. Sources close to Ms Rayner said a conveyancer and two experts in trust law had all suggested the amount of stamp duty she paid on the East Sussex property was correct and she acted on the advice she was given at the time.
But the conveyancing firm, Verrico and Associates, on Thursday said its lawyers “never” gave Ms Rayner tax advice and were being made “scapegoats”. In a statement, managing director Joanna Verrico said: “We’re not qualified to give advice on trust and tax matters and we advise clients to seek expert advice on these.”
The founder of the small high street firm, based in Herne Bay, Kent, said it completed her stamp duty return “based on the figures and the information provided by Ms Rayner”. Ms Rayner referred herself for an ethics investigation on Wednesday, admitting that she had not paid enough stamp duty on the purchase of the £800,000 flat.
She said she had initially been advised that she was not liable for the second property surcharge because she had sold her stake in her family home in Ashton-under-Lyne to a court-instructed trust established in 2020 to benefit her disabled son. But she conceded she had made a “mistake” after fresh legal advice from a “leading tax counsel” later revealed that she was liable for the extra duty on her new Hove flat.
Before then, she had insisted for weeks that she had paid the correct amount of tax.
