Angela Rayner - political hypocrite, yes or no?

[Agnes12]

Whatever the ins and outs, Angela says she is “proud” to have bought her council house 20 years ago under RTB. Angela has been a long-term Labour supporter and has come up through the Labour/Trade Union movement. I find it quite surprising that she has then bought a state owned asset, later sold at a profit.

I have never agreed with RTB but recognise for if you are given that opportunity you are probably going to take it. However for someone who purports to be a socialist isn’t this a tad hypocritical? Or doesn’t it matter and she should be allowed to take advantage of the scheme as she qualified?

Maybe you know unrepresentative Labour voters. Maybe a lot of people you know with children at state schools don’t go on about being Labour voters all the time but do vote for them. I’ve never met a Labour supporter who bangs on about it all the time while using an accountant to avoid tax and sending their children to independent schools and I’m a member of the Labour Party, so they sound a bit unusual.

You can not believe they should be an option but still use them while they are. I worked in two despite thinking they are wrong - practicalities of life sometimes make us act in ways which in an ideal world we wouldn’t have to. At least voting Labour (and hopefully engaging in campaigning) they might be trying to improve the state system which has been trashed by the Tories.

A bit like Lee Anderson who was Labour until he was kicked out, defected to the Tories and, now he’s blotted his copy book there, is flirting with Tice’s bunch of fascists.

Right to Buy had nothing to do with helping people to get on the property ladder. It was simply a vote buying tactic by Thatcher and it worked a treat. Former council tenants began voting Tory in their droves.

It also had nothing to do with her concern over entrenched inequality. Thatcher's Government had no intention of ploughing the proceeds back into new housing stock. They knew the takeup for RTB would be massive and would rid them of the responsibility of maintaining large swathes of council properties whilst hiding behind a banner of helping people. They couldn't have cared less what happened after that.

There is another long running thread about private schools and VAT etc.

Here's where me and my Labour supporting friends are:

"When Finland, many decades ago, effectively abolished private education, it made the clearly correct assumption that, if the rich and powerful knew their own children were likely to attend state-maintained schools, they would be keen to ensure that such schools were well funded. Finland is among Europe’s most educationally successful countries."

www.theguardian.com/theobserver/commentisfree/2024/feb/18/private-school-pupils-must-pay-vat-observer-letters

The issue with buying council houses was that council housing stock was sold off at knockdown prices and then nothing was built to replace it, which is why we have a crisis in social housing today. Council houses bought 20-30 years ago have allowed people to move up the property ladder and out of council housing. That should have freed up new social housing stock for those who needed it. However there is now no council housing and social housing has been largely outsourced to the private sector, at an extortionate mark up.

People with savings should be entitled to nothing

them when people weren’t eligible for furlough payment or grants because they didn’t have an established business with books
they fell into the bracket for universal credit which they didn’t get because they had savings she was outraged

oh and when slagging off public services pay rise asked what do you give them if you were in power would you give them the inflation matching pay rise you think they should have what a surprise no answer

Sorry, @rwalker, I don't understand. Can you do a link?

The pandemic was unique and in principal if you ve substantial savings, why should you get help?
The Govt set that rule on help for new small businesses NOT labour.

She, like all other opposition politicians cannot say what the Doctors etc should have because they are not privy to the books nor involved in the negotiations but the only time the RCN have been on strike is under a Tory Govt.

I find it weird that Tory supporters blame Labour for the countries issues, beyond weird actually.

She was saying they should get help

as for nhs pay rise she sat on morning tele slagging the offer off saying it was unacceptable as below inflation she was asked in that case would you back an inflation matching pay rise if you were in power and she said it wasn’t her job to tell the government what to do
that wasn’t the question she was asked totally non comital

She’s not the shadow chancellor and, as has already been pointed out, the Labour Party hasn’t seen how much money’s available. It’s shrouded in smoke and mirrors.

In simple terms by all means point out what’s shit
but tell me what you are going to do to make me vote for you never get a straight answer or a comment on policy

To put some context around that 23%, it’s equal to £575k. Or as much tax as around 150 people earning the average UK salary pay. How much more tax should he pay? I’ve just worked out that my effective tax rate, albeit on an income of a tenth of his, is only 21%. And that’s using perfectly legitimate tax planning. I don’t intend on paying any more than I have to, and I don’t see why anyone else should either.

it is worth noting that both Angela and her now husband benefited from right to buy, and there’s nothing wrong with that. But, there seems to be some doubt as to whether she actually lived in the house post purchase for the requisite amount of time to keep the right to buy discount, or whether in fact she lived with her husband and rented out the property she’d bought. I’m sure all will become clear though.

I'd like it if he paid the same as top bracket PAYE tax payers. That would seem fair and put some money back into his depleted coffers

@rwalker "In simple terms by all means point out what’s shit"

In simple terms tell me what is better after 14 years of Tory government. Anything?

Cost of living
NHS
GP appointments
Social care
Mortgages
Education
Children's services
Mental health provision
Police
Housing
Transport

I could go on, but feel free to pick anything.

Mine too. The cognitive dissonance is mind boggling!

I don’t intend on paying any more than I have to, and I don’t see why anyone else should either.

I’d like the multi millionaire PM to pay his fair share of tax. Hopefully the loopholes that allow wealthy people to pay a smaller proportion of their income than those on average salaries will be closed when we get shot of the Tories. I certainly hope so.

@Tryingtokeepgoing

"But, there seems to be some doubt as to whether she actually lived in the house post purchase for the requisite amount of time to keep the right to buy discount, or whether in fact she lived with her husband and rented out the property she’d bought. I’m sure all will become clear though"

+++

It's the point that she was registered on the electoral as living at the house when it appears she was living at her husbands house. Indeed her children's births were registered as living at the husband's address. And it then seems her brother was living at her house instead.

I don't know if this was done in order to get the maximum right to buy discount. But it would be illegal to register on the electoral roll at an address you don't live at. It would also mean that when she came to sell it then she would not have to pay capital gains tax as she could claim that it was her principal residence.

I first voted in 1982. Frankly I don’t remember any government making any tangible improvement over the last 42 years. It’s been downhill all the way. When I bought my first house interest rates were 17% , they came down pretty quickly and we were all in the money, or so we thought but the other affect of low interest rates was poor returns on savings and investments.
I lived through two stock market crashes and lost money on negative equity.
Basic rate tax was over 25% when I first started work. Although VAT was only 15%.
I can’t really say which party has really benefited me as an individual. But the pandemic and the subsequent inflation blip has bumped up my pension nicely.

I think that the personalities in the Labour Party are lacking the real muscle that drove the party in the eighties and nineties. The biggest loss was John Smith who was likely to be the leader that took us into the 21st century. Sadly, he died suddenly and left the party rudderless for some time.
Labour are brilliant at shooting themselves in the foot re leadership. They successfully avoided office for years under Corbyn.
Angela Rayner reminds me too much of the cool girls at my 1970s comprehensive who spent most of their time ruling the roost from the girls loos smoking and bullying anyone who tried to use the facilities. They were loud, uncouth and unable to think for themselves.
I hope we get a hung parliament so that the politicians spend all their time I fighting while the civil service quietly puts the country back together again.

Frankly I don’t remember any government making any tangible improvement over the last 42 years.

You must have been asleep from 1997 to 2010 then.

He doesn’t pay a smaller proportion though, since the tax take for someone on an average salary of £34k is a little under £4,300 - or 12.5%. So Rishi is paying nearly twice the amount proportionally and 150 times as much in absolute £ terms as the average tax payer.

Perhaps also you could highlight the loopholes that the wealthy can take advantage of, because as far as I can see everyone is taxed under the same rules so if there are some special wealthy person loopholes I’m all ears.

I also expect that a reasonable number of average, and indeed above average, earners are in receipt of some form of benefit top-up, be it child allowance, tax/universal credits or childcare, making their actual tax paid a negative number. Which is all absolutely right - we need to support the lower paid and those with children. But how much more is it reasonable for the higher paid to be taxed?

I’m not talking about the higher paid. I’m talking about the obscenely wealthy. At least Sunak’s wife is now paying tax on her millions after being shamed into it.

While you see that as a win, what it actually means is that, as a non-dom, she wasn’t paying tax on that income in the UK as she wasn’t required to. But she was paying tax in India when required to. Now she’s paying tax here. But no longer paying in India as she’s not required to. That’s really helping the developing world isn’t it. A country where the average income is less than £4k per person now gets less tax, while we get more. Well played.

This all day.

So what if she bought a council house. So what if she sold it and made money or didn't sell
It and lived in it.

She made a bit if money, it's not a great profit really. £50k? Not masses off a house sale.

She probably had to plough money in to get it in a nice condition like lots of us have to.

100% agree