Angela Rayner could return to frontline politics as ex Deputy PM vows to 'keep fighting' for ordinary people

The former Deputy Labour Leader visited the Hurst Hall Care Centre in her Ashton-under-Lyne constituency where she praised carers and criticised Reform UK, reported the Mirror.

Ms Rayner also called for party unity following infighting that has swallowed Labour over the last week, condemning it as "arrogant tittle tattle".

Asked if she would return to frontline politics, after Health Secretary Wes Streeting suggested he would love to see her back, Ms Rayner insisted she’d “not gone away” as she vowed to "keep fighting" for ordinary people.

The former carer quit as Deputy Prime Minister after failing to pay a £40,000 tax surcharge on a flat she bought.

She resigned after Sir Keir Starmer’s ethics adviser, Sir Laurie Magnus, found she broke the ministerial code by underpaying stamp duty on her £800,000 seaside flat.

She said: “I'm really humbled and I always have been, the people of Ashton-under-Lyne have always supported me.

“The 10 years that I've been in government I've had quite a number of front bench positions, and I've always brought it back to the people that I was there to represent and having this opportunity now, to be more in the constituency and to champion those views is something that I'm humbled to do and I'm looking forward to the challenge.

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“I’ve got a lot of interests like child poverty, the fair pay agreement, and making sure the Employment Rights Bill is carried out in full."

The warning comes amid a row about Keir Starmer's leadership, which saw Wes Streeting condemn a “toxic culture in Downing Street that needs to change".

When quizzed on this, Ms Rayner replied: “I think Wes has clearly set out his stall after what was clearly a very turbulent couple of days and I think being around here for the last hour just shows you actually that that tittle tattle in Westminster it almost looks arrogant when you've got real challenges that real people are facing and that's what we really need to be focusing on.”

Ms Rayner also reminded her Labour colleagues that they should be focusing on changing lives to deliver for Britain after 14 long years of Tory rule, in a plea for party unity,

She said: “I think the party should always be together, I've always been of that nature and the way in which I've worked within our movement is, our movement has many different views and we should always look to bind ourselves within that and the the risk that we have is actually 14 years of chaos from the Tories, we've got an opportunity to change people's lives.

“We've already delivered free breakfast clubs for kids in schools, rolling out more free meals for kids at lunch time, more police on the street, bringing down NHS waiting lists. These are things that we're really delivering, we've got the renters rights act as well.

“These are good material things that are going to make a difference, we can’t be drowning that out with tittle tattle in Westminster.

"We’ve got to be focused on the people we're there to represent.”