Who is Angela Rayner? The story behind the country’s possible next deputy PM
Angela Rayner is set to become the UK’s deputy prime minister if Labour wins the next general election.
With Labour’s annual conference starting this weekend, here’s what you need to know about the party’s deputy leader – from her early life and career in politics to the abuse and controversy she has faced.
Early life and career
Born in Stockport in 1980, Ms Rayner was brought up on a council estate. She left school at 16 with no qualifications and pregnant with her first son.
She says she was told she would “never amount to anything”.
“When I was young, we didn’t have books because my mother couldn’t read or write,” Ms Rayner said in an interview with the Financial Times.
She told the newspaper she could easily have been taken into care and admitted she felt “resentment” because, as a child, she had to look after her mother, who had bipolar disorder.
After giving birth, Ms Rayner went to college part-time, studying British sign language and social care.
Soon after becoming a care worker for the local council, she was put forward as a union rep.
“I was mouthy and I would take no messing from management,” Ms Rayner said.
From there, she became a full-time union official and rose through the ranks to become Unison’s convenor in the North West, representing 200,000 workers.
Ms Rayner married Unison official Mark Rayner in 2010. The couple separated in 2020.
She has three sons and in 2017, she became a grandmother.
Life in politics
Angela Rayner on the Labour frontbench with Jeremy Corbyn and Diane Abbott in 2017
Ms Rayner entered parliament In 2015, when she became the first woman MP in the 180-year history of her Ashton-under-Lyne constituency.
She went on to hold the position of shadow pensions minister, before becoming a member of the shadow cabinet, holding the education and women and equalities briefs.
She was elected as deputy leader of the Labour Party in 2020 but was sacked as party chair following poor results in the English local elections.
But she pushed back against Keir Starmer’s attempts to demote her and was eventually given a role as shadow minister for the cabinet office, as well as a newly created post as shadow secretary for the future of work.
In September 2023, she was appointed shadow levelling up secretary in a reshuffle aimed at putting the “strongest possible players on the pitch” ahead of the next election.
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‘Principles would not have fed me’
Ms Rayner is known for being on the left of the Labour Party and has described herself as a socialist “but not a Corbynite”.
But she has also defended compromises she has made with colleagues in the shadow cabinet, saying she will not let her principles “block” her party from getting elected.
Speaking to the Beth Rigby Interviews programme in January, she said it was “not about getting rid of my principles”.
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Beth Rigby interviews Angela Rayner
But she added: “When I was a free school meals kid, principles would not have fed me. It was the free school meals programme that Labour brought in.”
She said the only way for those projects to become a reality was a win at the ballot box, meaning the “overriding principle” for her was “delivery”.
Abuse and controversy
Ms Rayner has received rape and death threats and has talked about how she had panic buttons installed at her home.
In 2021, a man was sentenced after he admitted sending a threatening email telling her to “watch your back and your kids”.
Separately, on the day of the sentence, Ms Rayner apologised “unreservedly” for calling Conservatives “scum” during her party’s conference the previous month.
She had initially refused to apologise but later said she would not use the same language again having reflected on the “threats and abuse” that often feature in politics.
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September 2021: Angela Rayner defends calling Tories ‘scum’
In 2022, a Mail On Sunday article claimed Tory MPs had accused her of a “Basic Instinct” ploy to distract Boris Johnson by crossing and uncrossing her legs.
Describing the article as “disgusting”, Ms Rayner said the piece “wasn’t just about me as a woman, it was also steeped in classism and about where I come from, where I grew up”.
The article received a huge backlash, with even Boris Johnson saying while he did not agree with her politically, he “deplore[d] the misogyny directed at her anonymously”.
The boss of Unite, Labour’s biggest union funder, has threatened to break its link with the party unless it changes direction.
Sharon Graham, general secretary of the union, told Sky News that, on the eve of a crucial party conference for the prime minister, Unite‘s support for Labour was hanging in the balance.
She told Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips: “My members, whether it’s public sector workers all the way through to defence, are asking, ‘What is happening here?’
Sharon Graham has been a long-time critic of Sir Keir Starmer. Pic: PA
“Now when that question cannot be answered, when we’re effectively saying, ‘Look, actually we cannot answer why we’re still affiliated’, then absolutely I think our members will choose to disaffiliate and that time is getting close.”
Asked when that decision might be made, she cited the budget, on 26 November, as “an absolutely critical point of us knowing whether direction is going to change”.
Ms Graham, who became leader in 2021, has been a long-time critic of Sir Keir Starmer‘s agenda, accusing him of lacking vision.
The union has campaigned against his decision to cut winter fuel allowance for pensioners – which was later reversed – and has called for more taxes on the wealthy.
But the firm threat to disaffiliate, and a timetable, highlights the acute trouble Sir Keir faces on multiple fronts, after a rocky few months which have seen his popularity plummet in the polls and his administration hit by resignations and scandals.
There is now open discussion about his leadership, with Andy Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester, claiming he’s been urged by MPs to mount a challenge.
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Burnham: Labour leadership ‘not up to me’
Unite has more than a million members, the second-largest union affiliated to Labour. It donates £1.5m a year from its membership fees to the party.
The union did not make an additional donation to Labour at the last election – as it has done previously – but was the biggest donor to its individual MPs and candidates. It has donated millions to the party in the past.
Any decision to disaffiliate would need to be made at a Unite rules conference; of which the next is scheduled for 2027, but there is the option to convene emergency conferences earlier.
Just 15 months into Sir Keir’s premiership, in which he has promised to champion workers’ rights, Ms Graham’s comments are likely to anger the Labour leadership.
Sir Keir Starmer has seen his popularity plummet in the polls in recent months. Pic: AP
Read more: Now is moment of ‘maximum danger’ for Starmer, Harriet Harman warns
Unite, earlier this year, voted to suspend former deputy prime minister Angela Rayner of her union membership because of the government’s handling of a long-running bin strike in Birmingham.
Ms Graham has described the left-wing party being launched by Jeremy Corbyn as a “sideshow” and has brushed off speculation of a leadership challenge by Mr Burnham.
This summer, she said if Unite dropped support from Labour it would “focus on building a strong, independent workers’ union that was the true, authentic voice for workers”.
The annual Labour Party conference kicks off in Liverpool from Sunday.
As a union affiliated with Labour, Unite has seats on the party’s ruling national executive committee and can send delegates to its annual conference.
Watch the full interview with Sharon Graham on Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips from 8.30am on Sky News
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