Angela Rayner not returning her 17K severance payment

[MissionCreep]

After a year out of gov Angela Rayner is back obviously and today saying she won’t return the 17K severance payment because she ‘will deliver again’ in government. Just seems so grubby.

Same for Liz Truss taking the PM pension after crashing the economy. Just so tone deaf. I’m sure there are loads of other examples and I don’t think they’re OK either.

I don’t want this Burnham government to appear to be one that just looks out for itself. That was terrible for us in the Boris Johnson era. We should obviously not be harbouring any corruption from those in office, but also I want politicians to do the right thing in office even where the law doesn’t absolutely force them to.

So how long should people keep severance/redundancy payments to one side for, in case they are offered their job back?

This.

It was a designer shirt she bought from Oxfam. As if saying that would make her less hypocritical. It's not always about sexism and misogyny. Female MPs are open to criticism as much as the men. Maybe, if like Rayner, she didn't make personal attacks on the opposition she wouldn't be drawing attention to her attire. If you're going to call a political party garbage when they are sat behind you, you can expect a backlash and can't complain.

Which brand was the shirt?

There’s some defensive responders on here. The ‘shit stirring media’ reporting mentioning this fact and the audio clip with Raynor’s response that I mentioned was from Radio 4 this afternoon- the BBC are not exactly going around fomenting right wing hate, FFS. The response being made by Raynor does seem hypocritical, I don’t think it’s unfair to notice that.

People being made redundant who then are reemployed by the same employer, isn't the same thing. AR wasn’t made redundant, she had to leave her office under a cloud because at the time she didn’t pay enough tax, quite a different situation. (I accept it’s now been sorted out).

I find it disappointing, just wanted a few days to have an hopeful new start and already there’s this offkey note.

Who fucking cares. I’m surprised it wasn’t more by the fuss everyone was making then found out it was only £17K. It’s what she got and that’s that and now she’s back so what. It’s not like they have a choice at getting chopped and changed and in one minute out the next. It’s a thankless task.

The £450k was the total paid to multiple MPs so exactly the same as what she's getting.

Hardly seems like news to me, 17k.... honestly. There's a lot of spite and malicious intent with today's media.

Let them get on with the job and stop picking silly little things and turning them into an argument

I despise this woman but she has done nothing wrong

She’s disliked because she’s spiteful and dishonest.

Is she? What has she done that’s “spiteful”? She was found to have been ill advised, there was no suggestion of dishonesty.

Talk to me about her being spiteful and dishonest?

It's just the same hypocrisy as all politicians. There aren't many jobs you can get fired for misconduct and still get a redundancy payment in the first place. Even worse for the convicted fraudster Louise Haigh

Rayner resigned, she wasn’t fired. Haigh’s offence is spent under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act and it should never have been prosecuted in the first place.

If you were laid off, and then went back to work for the same employer a year later would you offer to pay back your redundancy payment? Thought not.

Well, if you resign even more reason to not get a severance package. No one in the real world gets a severance package if they choose to resign from a job - even if they don't resign under a cloud of tax fraud.

Rayner resigned, she wasn’t fired. Haigh’s incredibly low level offense was spent.

They do if they opt for voluntary redundancy.

Why can't anyone read the discussion last night? 😉

Rayner resigned because she had to. She had broken the ministerial code.

She was entitled to the payment.

That is voluntary redundancy not resigning, it is quite different. Plus she didn't take voluntary redundancy as you say she resigned as her position was untenable.

She only has to resign one more time and she will have have enough cash to pay off her tax fraud!

She’s probably spent it on her under paid stamp duty.

I wouldnt return it either

neither do I believe anyone else in her shoes would

I think there have been jokes along these lines ...

But seriously, after the Rayner affair (not because of it), it was brought in that you wouldn't get the payment if you had broken the ministerial code. My understanding is that even then, Angela would still have qualified - this is because that would have been a less serious misdemeanour.

Putting her back into housing was an interesting move. It certainly isn't good for her public image.