As LandlordZONE predicted last night, Angela Rayner has resigned from her posts as Housing Secretary, Deputy PM and Deputy Leader of the Labour Party following an investigations into her actions by Sir Laurie Magnus.
He looked into her purchase of a flat in Hove for £800,000 and her decision to pay the lower ‘main residence’ Stamp Duty rate after putting her northern family home into a trust.
In a letter published this morning Rayner says she ‘deeply regrets’ the decision, saying she wishes she had sought ‘additional tax advice’ saying she takes ‘full responsibility for this error’.
Magnus was appointed as the Prime Minister's Independent Adviser on Ministers' Interests in December 2022 by Rishi Sunak, a role that was then renamed the Independent Adviser on Ministerial Standards.
He has concluded she acted in good faith, but this wasn’t enough to save her skin, Rayner saying she realises her actions didn’t meet the 'highest standards'.
While tax experts have said putting a property into trust and getting that entity to buy the property off you in order to release equity, therefore making any subsequent property purchased your ‘main residence’, is an arcane but legal tactic, it is Rayner’s previous and subsequent actions that have caused the greatest problems.
The housing secretary, who has been in post since Labour’s landslide victory last year, has in the past not held back when criticising other senior politicians for ‘one rule for everyone, another rule for themselves’ – which now looks unfair given she sought intentionally or unintentionally to avoid paying the full Stamp Duty on her flat purchase in Hove.
Her other has been her attempt to blame the decision to pay the lower Stamp Duty rate on ‘advisors’ including the conveyancing firm that handled the purchase on her behalf, something she has now rowed back from.
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