Angela Rayner has branded shadow home secretary Chris Philp “Johnny Come Lately”, after he accused the Government of prioritising immigrants over young people when it comes to housing.
In a back and forth in the Commons, Mr Philp claimed landlords are being offered “above market deals” to secure properties for “illegal immigrants”.
As she deputised for Sir Keir Starmer who was attending the G7 summit, Ms Rayner accused the Tories of having “spiffed” a million pounds “up the wall because they were so incompetent”.
Speaking at Deputy Prime Minister’s Questions, Mr Philp said the Government’s “laughable plan to smash the gangs lies in tatters”, adding: “Will she now, at last, accept we need a removals deterrent, so every single illegal immigrant arriving on these shores is immediately removed?”
In her response, Ms Rayner said: “They lost control of our borders. We’re getting control of our borders. He needs to apologise.”
The shadow minister, who was standing in for Conservative Leader Kemi Badenoch, said Ms Rayner had a “brass neck” to claim she has immigration under control “when the numbers crossing the Channel this year are the highest in history”.
He added: “The Home Office’s suppliers are now actively offering above market deals to landlords to get hold of their properties to be used for illegal immigrants. In the meantime, hard-pressed young people here are unable to rent or buy. So why is this Government prioritising housing for illegal immigrants above housing for our young people?”
The Deputy Prime Minister replied: “Under their watch, immigration increased fourfold until it reached almost a million in a single year. They also created the backlog – 400 hotels, which we’ve reduced to just over 200 hotels in the first 12 months of us being in Government.
“One million pounds a day ‘spiffed’ up the wall because they were so incompetent. We’re building the homes that they failed to deliver over 14 years of consecutive failure by their government. They should apologise while we get on with the job of rebuilding Britain.”
Mr Philp then said: “Goodness me, she’s got a cheek,” before adding: “We need to scrap the Human Rights Act for immigration matters, so this sovereign Parliament decides on the law our courts apply, but her party voted against that. So I have a simple question: why did the Government side with foreign criminals and not the British public?”
In her response, Ms Rayner said 4,500 foreign national offenders have been deported since Labour came into power, adding: “I take no lectures from the Johnny Come Lately, who couldn’t do anything when he was in office.”
Elsewhere in the session, Mr Philp pressed Ms Rayner on the inquiry into grooming gangs and child sexual abuse urging her to apologise on behalf of the Prime Minister for saying campaigners were “jumping on a far-right bandwagon”.
He said he had met victims alongside Tory leader Kemi Badenoch on Tuesday, adding: “They told us how authorities deliberately covered up the systematic rape of young girls and some boys by gangs of predominately Pakistani heritage men.
“They covered it up because they cared more about so-called community relations than about protecting vulnerable girls. That is disgusting.”
Ms Rayner replied: “It’s absolutely right that we look at what’s happened over the last couple of decades. The countless reports that we’ve had, and we look to implement that. He’s absolutely right to also talk about the confidence people must have in that independent inquiry and the Home Secretary spoke about that earlier this week in regards to Baroness Casey’s report.
“So we will take that forward at speed, it will be independent, it will have statutory powers and we will implement the Jay report.”
Mr Philp then said: “It’s vital that scandals like this are never again covered up because of the racial background of perpetrators, and Baroness Casey’s report said people who downplay the ethnic dimension are letting victims down.”
He added: “I do have to raise the language the Prime Minister used in January when he, I’m afraid to say, smeared campaigners as jumping on a ‘far-right bandwagon’, simply for calling for the very inquiry he has now been forced to set up. Standing up for rape victims is not far-right.
“So will the Deputy Prime Minister apologise for what the Prime Minister said?”
Ms Rayner replied: “The Prime Minister did not just raise issues, but acted on them. He brought the first prosecutions against grooming gangs, called for action to address ethnicity issues in 2012, and (Mr Philp) will know that the data that the previous government collected was inaccurate and not complete, and Casey recognised this, and it’s one of the recommendations we will be taking forward.
“The Prime Minister made those comments specifically about Tory ministers who sat for years in the government and did absolutely nothing about this scandal.”
