Deputy Labour leader Angela Rayner has promised she will step down if she is found to have committed a crime, but she is “confident” that she has followed the rules.
It comes after Greater Manchester Police (GMP) confirmed on Friday that it’s examining allegations that she may have broken electoral law by providing false information about her main residence a decade ago.
Ms. Rayner has been accused of a potential rule breach because the address that she said was her principal property at the time was different from her husband’s address.
She also faced questions over whether she paid the right amount of tax when she sold her property in 2015.
GMP previously said there would be no police investigation, but confirmed on Friday that it was examining whether any offences have been committed following a reassessment of the information provided by Conservative Party Deputy Chairman James Daily.
Ms. Rayner, the MP for Ashton-under-Lyne, denied allegations against her and said the questions over her tax affairs were “manufactured” in an attempt to smear her.
After the police confirmed there was an investigation, Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said he was “confident” his deputy had not broken any rules and declined to answer whether Ms. Rayner should resign as the party’s deputy leader if she is found guilty.
Defence Secretary Grant Shapps accused Ms. Rayner, who previously called for former Prime Minister Boris Johnson to resign when he came under police investigation over a breach of lockdown rules, of applying “double standards.”
In a statement on Friday, Ms. Rayner said she will step down if she’s found guilty.
“I will say as I did before—if I committed a criminal offence, I would of course do the right thing and step down. The British public deserves politicians who know the rules apply to them,” she said.
The MP said she’s “completely confident” she did not break any rules, and accused the Conservative Party of using police investigations as an election tactic.
“I’ve repeatedly said I would welcome the chance to sit down with the appropriate authorities, including the police and HMRC, to set out the facts and draw a line under this matter. I am completely confident I’ve followed the rules at all times,” she said in a statement.
“I have always said that integrity and accountability are important in politics. That’s why it’s important that this is urgently looked at, independently and without political interference.”
Ms. Rayner said she makes “no apologies for having held Conservative ministers to account in the past,” because that is what the public expected of her as a deputy leader of the opposition.
“We have seen the Tory Party use this playbook before—reporting political opponents to the police during election campaigns to distract from their record,” she asserted.
Ms. Rayner has faced scrutiny about whether she paid the right amount of tax on the 2015 sale of her Stockport council house because of confusion over whether it was her principal residence.
She has rejected suggestions in a book by former Tory deputy chairman Lord Ashcroft that she failed to properly declare her main home and dismissed the attacks in recent weeks as a political smear.
The unauthorised biography alleges that she bought the property with a 25 percent discount in 2007 under the right-to-buy scheme introduced by former Conservative prime minister Margaret Thatcher.
The former carer is said to have made a £48,500 profit when selling the house eight years later.
Government guidance says that a tenant can apply to buy their council home through the right-to-buy scheme if it is their “only or main home.”
Her husband was listed at another address in Lowndes Lane, about a mile away, which had also been bought under the right-to-buy scheme.
In the same year as her wedding, Ms. Rayner is said to have re-registered the births of her two youngest children, giving her address as where her husband resided.
Ms. Rayner has insisted that Vicarage Road was her “principal property” despite her husband living elsewhere at the time.
