deputy PM ‘received fresh legal advice on Monday’

The word “bitch” along with a much larger sign saying “tax evader!” have been pictured on a white wall on the outside of the deputy prime minister’s property.

Across the road, “Tax evader Rayner” and “Rayner tax avoidance” have been graffitied on construction chipboard.

For days, it has been clear that Angela Rayner needed to be more transparent about her tax affairs and living arrangements.

After reports suggested that the deputy prime minister failed to pay the correct level of stamp duty when purchasing an £800,000 seaside flat in Hove, East Sussex, she has finally broken cover. After initially insisting she had done nothing wrong, Ms Rayner admitted on Wednesday that she had indeed failed to pay enough duty on the property. In doing so Ms Rayner (salary £159,584) may have saved herself £40,000.

As the second most senior member of a government threatening to raise taxes on homeowners, she faces an accusation not only of ministerial impropriety but of hypocrisy.

• Read The Times View in full: Rayner’s failings leave serious questions to answer

Angela Rayner has regularly paid public tribute to her disabled son, describing how he “beat all the odds to survive” and is an NHS miracle.

The deputy prime minister has discussed him while promoting initiatives such as “buddy dogs” and charities that support families with prematurely born children. Rayner has also been upfront about the challenges faced after his birth at 23 weeks, when she was told he would not survive the night.

But on Wednesday, for the first time, her son — now in his late teens — was placed at the very heart of her political life as she sought to explain her financial affairs.

• Read article in full: The truth about the trust set up for Angela Rayner’s disabled son

The chancellor declined to say whether she thought stamp duty was too complicated.

Rachel Reeves instead said it was “incumbent on all of us to try to properly understand the rules”. She added that what matters is that Angela Rayner’s situation is “quickly resolved”.

People understand that Rayner is “trying to do the right thing” for her children, while also fulfilling her duties as an MP and as deputy prime minister, Reeves said.

Rachel Reeves has said she has “full confidence” in Angela Rayner.

The chancellor told broadcasters that the deputy prime minister was a “good friend and colleague”.

She said: “She has accepted that the right stamp duty wasn’t paid. That was an error, that was a mistake. She is working hard now to rectify that, in contact with HMRC, to make sure that the correct tax is paid.”

Reeves said “it is right” that people pay the right amount of tax and “important” that people in public life lead by example. She added that “anyone who saw Angela’s statement yesterday will have a lot of sympathy with some of the challenging family circumstances around this around Angela’s disabled son”.

Angela Rayner entered the House of Commons for prime minister’s questions to the unlikely sound of complete silence (Tom Peck writes). She looked ashen-faced, as well she might. She’d been on Sky News, fighting back tears, not half an hour before, and she was still fighting them back now.

The Conservative benches had the good sense not to barrack her. Yes, she’d just had to admit she’d referred herself to the adviser for ministerial standards over an unpaid tax bill of some £40,000. But at the heart of the matter are the living arrangements, and indeed the compensation paid, to her disabled son. As she arrived in a state of near grief, her own side also decided against offering any sort of supportive cheers of their own, which was not to be expected and does not bode well.

• Read article in full: Angela Rayner’s ashen day in the house

Sir Laurie Magnus’s investigation into Angela Rayner’s second-home tax bill could conclude as early as today, senior government figures believe.

The independent adviser on ministerial standards only launched his investigation on Wednesday after Rayner referred herself over the underpayment of stamp duty.

The housing secretary is understood to have handed over all the evidence, which she claims proved that she acted in good faith but received faulty advice from lawyers.

Downing Street sources said they believed that Magnus would conduct a swift investigation and suggested it was possible he could send his finding to the prime minister as early as today.

However, it is understood that Magnus has not put a definite timescale on his probe — and will want to ensure that he has all the facts before concluding whether or not Rayner acted properly in the transaction.

The Conservative Party chairman has again called for Angela Rayner’s resignation.

Kevin Hollinrake told Times Radio that Rayner was “hiding now behind expert legal advice” and should quit.

Hollinrake also defended the Conservative leader, Kemi Badenoch, after criticism that she did not use Prime Minister’s Questions to put significant pressure on Sir Keir Starmer over the issue.

Asked what went wrong, he replied: “I don’t think anything went wrong. Straight away, straight out the traps, Kemi Badenoch said ‘has the prime minister got any backbone, should he sack her?’

“I think Kemi took the decision there are other things on people’s minds, not least the cost of living, taxation going up, unemployment going up … you have the opportunity to interrogate the prime minister about the many issues of the day and that is what she decided to do.”

Sir Keir Starmer will do “everything he can” to save Angela Rayner after she admitted that she failed to pay a £40,000 tax bill on her second home.

The deputy prime minister referred herself to the ethics watchdog after conceding that she had not paid a stamp duty surcharge on the purchase of an £800,000 seaside flat on the south coast. She said she had considered resigning over the matter.

Rayner has claimed for weeks that she did nothing wrong when she bought the property in Hove, East Sussex, and repeatedly insisted that she had paid the full amount of tax.

• Read article in full: Angela Rayner admits she failed to pay enough stamp duty on property

Angela Rayner’s political future now rests in the hands of Sir Laurie Magnus.

The prime minister’s adviser on ministers’ interests will rule on whether she knowingly dodged her tax bill — and if the process broke government ethics rules.

So what are the issues that Magnus will examine and what will ultimately decide her fate?

• Will Angela Rayner resign? What tax row means for Keir Starmer

Amid growing concern over whether Rayner can survive in her job, a cabinet minister has declined to say whether the deputy prime minister will still be in post by Christmas.

The education secretary told LBC she would not “speculate on or pre-judge” the outcome of an investigation by the prime minister’s ethics adviser.

She said: “We’ve got a process that’s under way with the independent adviser. I’m not going to get into hypotheticals or speculate. I’m sorry to disappoint you. I’m just not going to do it. That process will run its course.”

Bridget Phillipson’s revelation that Angela Rayner was told on Monday that she may have breached tax rules on her second home will increase pressure on Downing Street.

Rayner’s allies yesterday insisted that it was only on Wednesday that she was told that she had paid too little stamp duty on the Hove flat — but now Phillipson has admitted she received initial advice to that effect on Monday.

That will lead to questions as to why Downing Street continued to defend Rayner for two days when it should have been aware that Rayner’s denials were most probably inaccurate.

• How Angela Rayner’s private life finally brought her to the brink

Angela Rayner received fresh legal advice on her tax affairs on Monday, the education secretary has said.

Bridget Phillipson told Times Radio that after concerns were raised in public about the tax she had paid, Rayner had commissioned independent legal advice. An initial version of this advice came back on Monday but it was not until Wednesday the barrister reached his final conclusion, she claimed.

Bridget Phillipson

CHRIS LOBINA/SKY NEWS/PA

“That original version returned on Monday, but it wasn’t later clarified until the Wednesday further questions that were addressed through the advice,” she told Sky News.

Asked whether the prime minister, Sir Keir Starmer, had known Rayner had underpaid tax on Monday, Phillipson said: “The deputy prime minister has been clear for some time that she believed she had acted in good faith, that she had paid what was required of her through that house purchase. It then became clear subsequently that that wasn’t the case, that additional stamp duty was owed.

“That was following new, fresh legal advice, but as I say there were limitations on what could be discussed given the existence of a court order that was there to protect her family and to protect her son.”