Angela Rayner has been accused of hypocrisy after it was discovered she made a £48,500 profit on her ex-council house thanks to the right-to-buy policy she now wants to reform.
Accusation Levied Against Her
Critics say Labour’s deputy leader wants to ‘pull up the ladder’ to make it harder for other social housing tenants to benefit in the same way she did.
Ms Rayner is also Shadow Housing Secretary, and has spoken out against those who get ‘loads and loads of discount’ when purchasing their properties under the right-to-buy policy first introduced by Margaret Thatcher, and long despised by the Left.
But she bought her own former council house in Stockport, Greater Manchester, with a 25 per cent discount in 2007 – making the five-figure profit when she sold it at the market rate eight years later.
The purchase is revealed in a new book by Lord Ashcroft, which will be serialised exclusively on Sunday next month.
There Are Some Questions
The volume, Red Queen? The Unauthorised Biography Of Angela Rayner, raises other questions about the outspoken MP’s living arrangements.
Official documents seen by this newspaper show that she was registered on the electoral roll at the ex-council house in Vicarage Road for five years after she married Mark Rayner in 2010.
What Documents Reveal
Despite them being newlyweds, her husband was listed elsewhere – a house in Lowndes Lane, just over a mile away, which had also been bought under the right-to-buy scheme.
More mysteriously, when Ms Rayner re-registered the births of her two youngest children that same year, she gave her address as Lowndes Lane. It is not clear, therefore, where she was living after her marriage.
The confusion is significant because under electoral rules, voters are expected to register at their permanent home address. Breaches of the rules can lead to a prison sentence.
Also, anyone buying a right-to-buy property usually signs a form confirming that it is their only or principal home, to avoid the properties being used by profiteering private landlords.
Neighbours of both properties claimed Ms Rayner moved out of Vicarage Road in 2009 and into Lowndes Lane.
Saturday night, a Labour spokesman said that the council house purchase had been ‘done by the book’ – and went on the attack against ‘Belize-based Tory billionaire Lord Ashcroft’ for taking ‘an unhealthy interest in Angela’s family’.
The spokesman said: ‘Angela, who had an older child from a previous relationship, and her husband maintained their existing residences before moving into their shared marital home.
‘Their son was born just 23 weeks into her pregnancy and spent eight months in intensive care, requiring ongoing support from a wide network of friends and family, including Angela’s brother… Beyond the smears, there is no suggestion any rules have been broken.’
About Right-to-buy Policy
Right-to-buy was one of the flagship policies of Mrs Thatcher’s Government, boosting home ownership by allowing council tenants to purchase the property they rented for a generous discount depending on how long they had lived there.
Tenants must repay some of the discount if they sell within five years – a penalty Ms Rayner avoided by waiting eight years.
When Labour’s No 2 was asked about the policy last year she said: ‘I think we need to review the way right-to-buy works’ adding that one area that needed to be looked at was ‘how much of a discount’ is on offer.
She added: ‘If someone’s lived in their property for a long time, they’ve been paying rent and it’s their home, then, yes, right-to-buy it. But that right isn’t that you get loads, loads of discount and we can’t replace the stock.’
What Critics Say
Critics say that in some areas more than half the houses sold through the policy are owned by private landlords who can then charge more rent than the council.
Tory MP Jacob Young said: ‘This is staggering hypocrisy from the deputy leader of the Labour Party. Having personally benefited from the right-to-buy discount, she now wants to pull up the ladder on other council tenants wanting to buy their home.
‘Not only that, she appears to have moved into a second home only two years later, also bought under right-to-buy.’
