Labour Councillor Sebastian Salek claimed Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner “can’t do anything right” as he leapt to her defence over her stamp duty saving – but GB News host Nana Akua wasn’t having any of it during their explosive debate this afternoon.
Speaking directly to Salek, Akua said Rayner’s primary residence “is probably her own in London because she is there for four or five nights a week”. She continued: “I am wondering if she pays council tax on that?”
Salek replied: “She has designated her Manchester home to be her primary residence. We know she doesn’t pay council tax on her home in London because it is owned by the government, and the government pays council tax. There is nothing new about that. Every politician who has lived in that building has never paid council tax.”
However, Akua clapped back: “That’s not true. No, that’s not true, that’s not true. There are a couple of them. So Michael Gove got in trouble for it because people were saying he should pay his council tax on the grace and favour property that he had. John Prescott also got in trouble for that, so that’s not true.
“People did not like the optics of it, and so they insisted they paid the council tax. I don’t like the optics of this – she had three potential properties in which she could live.
“The one she is calling her main residence, which apparently she’s very rarely there… I don’t know the truth of that, but she has designated that her main residence just before purchasing another property, thereby saving herself about £40,000 worth of stamp duty.”
When he had the chance to respond, Salek replied: “Whether you like its optics or not is entirely irrelevant. What I would ask you is – has she done anything wrong?”
Akua admitted: “She hasn’t done anything illegal, but it looks pretty bad.” As she was making her point, the Labour politician interjected as the debate continued to heat up.
Determined to make her case, Akua said, “She’s the Housing Minister. She’s been talking about wealth and ensuring that people don’t hide their wealth, and here she is doing something that very much looks like tax avoidance to me.”
The councillor then said he felt this whole debate was “laced with a heavy amount of misogyny, and was “really unpleasant to see”.