UK Deputy PM Angela Rayner resigns over tax issues, triggering reshuffle

UK Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner resigned from her post after a watchdog’s investigation into her tax affairs, triggering a government reshuffle and throwing Keir Starmer’s premiership into further disarray. 

Rayner’s resignation came after the government’s independent ethics adviser, Laurie Magnus, delivered a report to the premier on Friday that found she had breached the ministerial code of conduct. Magnus said that while Rayner had “acted with integrity” in the course of the investigation, she had broken the rules governing ministers’ behavior by failing to pay the correct taxes on a property purchase. 

Starmer planned to conduct a government reshuffle on Friday afternoon, a government spokesperson said, without elaborating on what posts would be involved. Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves will remain in her role, according to a person familiar with the matter. 

The acrimonious departure of the minister who was on paper the second-most senior member of Starmer’s administration is a significant loss that threatens to further darken the mood surrounding the governing Labour Party. Starmer has become unpopular since winning the general election last July and his party trails Nigel Farage’s Reform UK in opinion polls. 

It leaves a power vacuum at the top of the government that will need to be filled at a time when Starmer can ill-afford fresh internal pressures, a matter complicated by the fact Labour’s deputy leader role is an elected post. Rayner also quit her party role, triggering an internal election to replace her in that position, a person familiar with the matter said. 

Rayner acknowledged on Wednesday that she had underpaid property taxes on the purchase of an £800,000 ($1.1 million) home in Hove, in southern England. That followed days of media reports about her complex financial arrangements after her divorce, which she said were put in place in the interest of her child, who is disabled. 

The revelations were particularly awkward because Rayner also held the role of housing secretary in addition to being deputy prime minister. She was also Labour’s chief attack dog against Conservative politicians during the party’s years in opposition, and had frequently calling for Tory ministers to resign, including over claims they had avoided tax, leaving her open to the charge of hypocrisy. 

Rayner’s effective sacking from government would appear to put her political future into question. She had been tipped as a potential successor to Starmer as prime minister and was a popular figure among both party members and trade unions, something that would have seen her be a front-runner in any future leadership contest. Those prospects have likely been badly damaged by her admission she had underpaid her taxes.