The row over the purchase of a third home by Angela Rayner, deputy Prime Minister, and her tax arrangements shows no sign of going away. Here, Gregor Gall argues that Rayner plays an important role for Sir Keir Starmer

The last two weeks have been a torrid time for Angela Rayner, deputy Prime Minister and deputy Labour Party leader. She has hardly been out of the news and off the front pages of the tabloids.

The appropriateness of her appellation as Angela ‘Red’ Rayner has taken a deep dive after having been revealed to have recently become Angela ‘Three Residencies’ Rayner.

She bought a flat in Hove near Brighton for a reputed price tag of £800,000 in May this year after having had her name taken of the deeds of the house she part owned with her ex-husband in Ashton-Under-Lyne.

This house is still registered as her constituency address where she pays council tax but it was essentially ‘flipped’ – as other MPs have done before – so that she did not have to pay extra tax on the Hove flat had it been her second home. This saved her some £40,000.

As Deputy PM, she also has a ‘grace and favour’ residency in Admiralty House on Whitehall in London.

All this does not look quite so clever given she is also Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government at a time of record homelessness, a shortage of affordable housing to buy, rising rents, and local council finances at breaking point.

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