Angela Rayner cleared by HMRC over tax affairs paving the way for potential leadership bid
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/may/14/angela-rayner-cleared-hmrc-tax-affairs-labour-leadership-starmer
Posted by OneLegTooFew
Angela Rayner cleared by HMRC over tax affairs paving the way for potential leadership bid
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/may/14/angela-rayner-cleared-hmrc-tax-affairs-labour-leadership-starmer
Posted by OneLegTooFew
25 Comments
The hubris of politicians is off the scale. She’ll be far more unpopular with the voters than even Starmer is and this will be the final nail in Labour’s coffin.
She got two sets of legal advice and went with the one that resulted in her paying the less tax, what a strange coincidence!
Some things she’s previously said:
“@jeremycorbyn correct to raise tax dodging issue, the public are furious with those who get away with tax avoidance while they pay!”
“HMRC staff cut as corporate/super rich tax dodgers not challenged, PM does not have the answers, tax avoidance damaging our country.”
“Tax avoidance costs lives.”
People will point to other politicians that are worse than her in this regard but politicians should be held to their own standards. I think voters hate hypocrites more than anything.
Using her disabled son as a shield against criticism is pretty disgusting IMO.
Some very mad commentary already, she was cleared, get over it.
She feels “bruised” about the experience and upset about “intrusion” into her sons life?
Gurl…
Maybe should have listened to advice of your lawyers and seek help of a tax expert…
She has noone else to blame other than herself. Welp, this little bit tells me enough about the type of person she is.
Cleared? No she wasn’t, she was found in the wrong and has had to pay the £40k she avoided 😂 while for her it’s good that it’s over she’s been found on the wrong side of this and that’s unwanted baggage if she wants to be the leader, the opposition won’t let her forget it no matter how much she wants everyone to
Title is misleading. Still paid £40k in additional stamp duty through the check- just didn’t pay a penalty.
Seems that the guardian doesn’t know the difference between tax avoidance and evasion?
Then again from quotes in the article Rayner doesn’t either, so they’re in good company.
I’m going to say it out loud: I want Keir Starmer to stay as Prime Minister. I don’t want a revolving door of PMs
Not a great start and will always be referred to as the tax dodger.
Yet if I failed to pay tax I would be warned, fined and prosecuted, HMRC can screw itself
Oh fuck can you imagine that leading the country, bejeebus
Angela Rayner is not fit to be PM. She is not the answer.
Yey its a three horse race down the spiral into oblivion!
Christ.. she or Streeting would be an utter disaster.
Can we stop trying to bin off a PM every time a bit of bad news happens? Like a bunch of bloody kids crying at every little thing. The fuck are we paying them all this money for if they keep squabbling instead of looking to the betterment of our country?
0.6% growth and Rayner cleared. Wes is having a bad morning.
So she didn’t pay enough but she was not aware. Her accountants or solicitors got it wrong on her behalf. She’s now settled.
Honestly pathetic how much noise came out of the media over this. And I thought she was doing a good job as deputy too. The only way Kier had any working class support.
What do we learn? Politicians need to grow a spine.
You are elected for however many years. Do the work.
Pay someone to deal with critcisms while you carry on doing the work. If the criticism was unfounded, sue the publisher for slander. It’s too easy to ruin reputation with no consequences.
Kier is doing alright too. Get shit done. Get some changes through that benefit people, and call it the Labour ______ act 2026. Or the Starmer Saves Steel Act 2027.
Make improvements and claim them. We far too often have loud politicians claiming credit for other people’s work.
This 100% seems to be about Labout MP egos and has not really considered what the public want.
There’s no better alternative than Kier, so just stop.
what would honestly be the point in a Rayner premiership? aside from maybe having a slightly better relationship with trade unions, there’s been absolutely no suggestion of how she would reverse the systemic problems the country is facing
The lack of an HMRC fine when she was advised to seek specialist and didn’t (thus acting carelessly) doesn’t smell right.
She’s going to win the leadership election then if Burnham isn’t allowed to stand.
Angela Rayner has something Keir Starmer has lost or never had – a sense of what has fractured this country and driven people into the arms of charlatans like Farage.
Labour have a massive majority but seem paralysed by fear and won’t use it. They should be breaking the power of the media moguls and techno-fascists and telling Trump to go fuck himself. That would have an immediate and positive effect on Labours popularity.
They also need to tax the rich and attack the gross inequality that Starmer has not addressed. A big part of why Labour are in a mess is because they have been too cautious and too moderate.
I do not think Starmer has done a bad job but he is managerial in an era of noisy populists. He needs to go. Whether Angela Rayner is the right replacement is debatable but she is a better prospect than most.
Make her the chancellor. Maybe she can find away to not pay some of massive amounts of extra interest Britain will be paying on its enormous debt when they get rid of Starmer and Reeves
I actually quite like Rayner she was done dirty being forced to quit over something that was essentially an accounting error. That said, none of these muppets realise that changing leader would be disastrous
If Labour think she is the answer they are already done for
She’s as rough as a badgers ass and hardly what the UK wants to stick up on the world stage as our leader lol
They would all just laugh at Milliband
Dunno what the world would think of Streeting
Where as Andy Burnham would carry respect I think and def better than the others