Should Angela Rayner resign?

Angela Rayner is under growing pressure to stand down after admitting she underpaid stamp duty on an £800,000 flat in Hove.

The deputy prime minister has agreed that she made a "mistake" and has referred herself to the prime minister's independent ethics adviser, but many already feel that her position is untenable.

What did the commentators say?

"Rayner appears to have put herself on the fast track to the exit door," said David Maddox in The Independent. She is the secretary of state for housing and, fundamentally, "you cannot be guilty of avoiding stamp duty payments on buying property and be in charge of housing". The "old adage was that sex scandals did for Tories and money ones ended Labour careers" and that "seems to be coming true" once more.

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This episode is "especially damaging" for Keir Starmer as he "tries to reset his government" and as the Treasury considers "whether to raise property taxes", said Robert Mendick in The Telegraph. The PM is also "facing questions" himself over "whether he misled the public when he defended Rayner earlier this week".

Her future now rests on "whether Starmer decides that he can withstand" an expected "onslaught" from the Tories, said Kiran Stacey in The Guardian. Given the pair's previous "turbulent relationship" and Starmer's "reputation for ruthlessness", Rayner must feel vulnerable.

With government approval "slumping" in the polls, some Labour MPs fear the saga could further "undermine public support", said Jim Pickard in the Financial Times, but it may not be "entirely unhelpful" to Starmer if the row leaves Rayner, a "potential challenger" to his leadership, "wounded" but "still in the cabinet".

Rayner "brings colour and vim" to the front bench, as well as a "gutsy" origin story that garners "a lot of sympathy, across the political divide", and my impression is that Starmer "fiercely wants to keep her" in her current job, said Andrew Marr in The New Statesman. Ultimately, she may be saved by the fact that "many of her natural foes" in other parties might be "reluctant to cast the first stone".

What next?

Rayner must now wait for the outcome of an ethics investigation by Laurie Magnus, Starmer's adviser on ministerial standards. He will look at the paper trail and establish a timeline of who knew what and when.

The investigation could conclude within days but, even if Rayner survives, there'll be "a real price for Labour to pay", said The New Statesman's Marr. She's long been a "finger-jabbing prosecutor against Tory sleaze", so her own embroilment in an ethics row may be received by voters with a "snort of disgust".