Angela Rayner dodged £40,000 in stamp duty.
She didn’t fess up. She got found out.
For weeks Labour ministers claimed that she had done nothing wrong.
The Prime Minister defended her and refused to sack her. But while she was dodging her taxes, Labour spent the summer planning to raise property taxes on ordinary law- abiding families at the Budget in November.
Angela Rayner was leading the charge, writing to the Treasury in a memo that was then leaked, demanding higher stamp duty.
It’s nothing less than pure hypocrisy. And now the dust is settling on this scandal, it’s clear that Labour has no moral authority to raise taxes on family homes.
Last summer, when I was Shadow Housing Secretary, I faced Rayner across the House of Commons.
I warned that, while she might feel great then, it wouldn’t be long before things started to go downhill for her.
But even I didn’t expect that things would blow up this quickly.
Angela Rayner (pictured) dodged £40,000 in stamp duty. She didn’t fess up. She got found out. For weeks Labour ministers claimed that she had done nothing wrong. The Prime Minister defended her and refused to sack her, writes Kemi Badenoch
Last summer, when I was Shadow Housing Secretary, I faced Rayner across the House of Commons. I warned that, while she might feel great then, it wouldn’t be long before things started to go downhill for her, says Badenoch
Keir Starmer dithered because he was too weak to act. Even when the evidence was clear in the ethics adviser’s report, the Prime Minister was too weak to sack her, letting her resign instead, Badenoch adds
Her departure from Government was inevitable as soon as evidence of her tax impropriety came to light – exposed brilliantly by a team of researchers at Conservative HQ and our media.
I’ve lost count of the times that Rayner was first out of the blocks to call for a Conservative minister to fall on their sword immediately. But when her own time came, she desperately tried to cling on.
Keir Starmer dithered because he was too weak to act. Even when the evidence was clear in the ethics adviser’s report, the Prime Minister was too weak to sack her, letting her resign instead.
It’s one rule for them and another rule for the rest of us.
This summer has been an endless round of tax speculation. Each story leaked from the Treasury.
Every one of them designed to soften the ground at the Budget. But British families know that the only reason their taxes will be going up again
is because Rachel Reeves raised them last year, killing growth and trapping us in her tax doom loop.
We will pay Reeves’ tax penalty unless the Government listens to our simple message that we as a country have to start living within our means. That means cutting spending.
Britain’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer speaks to ship builders during a visit to BAE Systems Scotstoun on September 4, 2025 in Glasgow, Scotland
Angela Rayner speaks during the launch of Labour’s Local Election campaign on March 30, 2023
Labour’s plans include more taxes on British families buying or saving for a home, helping their children get on the property ladder, or saving for retirement. They even want to create a new annual family homes tax.
All while the Housing Secretary was dodging £40,000 in stamp duty.
Conservatives have said enough is enough. On the very day the former Deputy Prime Minister admitted underpaying property taxes, we forced a vote in Parliament.
Our position is clear: no new taxes on family homes. What did Labour do? Refuse to rule out hiking them by voting down our commitment.
After Labour’s catastrophic failure to get a grip on welfare spending, the Chancellor has now set her sights on the family home.
One of the tax rises she is considering is adding capital gains tax to homes. This would cost the average family £14,640, rising to £23,000 in the South East and £33,000 in London.
When I visited families in Reigate, Surrey, last Monday to talk about housing, they told me they simply couldn’t afford that.
Fresh from her disastrous Family Farm Tax, Reeves is even considering scrapping the rule which allows parents to help their children get on the property ladder.
It would mean death duties and inheritance tax hiked even further.
There’s nothing that’s sacred for this Labour Party, which knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.
The British public will not stand for a Prime Minister who repeatedly defended a minister failing to pay their taxes, and who attempts to extract ever more out of law-abiding citizens when they do the right thing – working, saving and investing.
The question is not just ‘Will they raise taxes on homes?’ It’s ‘Can they?’ My answer is a simple no.
Only the Conservatives believe our country must live within its means. Only the Conservatives have serious plans to bring down spending so we can lower tax and protect family homes from new taxes.
