![]() Well, I’m not thick, obviously, otherwise I wouldn’t have got where I am today. “Or saying I’m thick because I haven’t been to university and can’t speak properly. “Most of the trolling is misogynistic – calling me a bitch and things like that,” she says, shaking her head. On social media, she has been taunted for her accent, her appearance and simply for being a working-class woman in parliament. I bump into them and it’s like, ‘Oh! Hello…’” I don’t think they are deliberately patronising or derogatory, it’s more that I’m a bit of an enigma. “They don’t know how to interact, because they don’t often meet people like me and it’s almost a bit awkward for them. ![]() “Quite a number of Conservatives are quite scared of me,” she says, chuckling. She finds that many Conservative members approach her with a degree of trepidation or bemusement. It’s the nasty, anonymous briefings to the press that give the idea that parliamentarians are a bunch of horrible, back-stabbing individuals, but I don’t recognise that on a day-to-day basis.” We may have a difference of opinion, and that’s fine, but we generally rub along OK. “We’re all parliamentarians and it’s about respecting the fact that we are all here to represent our constituents. “I speak to, and get on with, Conservative members, SNP members and Lib Dems,” she says, cheerily. ![]() Photograph: Jessica Taylor/AFP/Getty Imagesįor all that, she thinks that most parliamentarians of whatever political hue are decent and respectful people trying to do their job as best they can. Rayner was famously accused by anonymous supporters of Boris Johnson of trying to distract him by crossing and uncrossing her legs, a tactic she describes as “ridiculous and abhorrent”. A few weeks ago, SNP deputy Mhairi Black announced she would be stepping down at the next election, citing Westminster’s “outdated sexist and toxic” working environment. A recent report said that 69% of female MPs had witnessed sexist behaviour in parliament in the past five years. In parliament, she has been mocked by Dominic Raab for daring to attend the opera, the inference being it is not for the likes of her. Rayner is that rarer thing still, a Labour politician from a desperately deprived working-class background, whose first-hand experience – growing up in poverty, becoming pregnant at 16, and leaving school early with few prospects – is the defining element of her politics, and her life. ![]() They’re not deliberately patronising, it’s more that I’m an enigma That’s quite rare in politics when people reach a certain level.” A lot of Conservatives don’t meet people like me. She can be a law unto herself, but she hasn’t forgotten where she comes from or who she started out with. “I don’t want to be too unkind to my colleagues, but the parliamentary Labour party is not exactly full of people you’d choose to go to the pub with, but there are still some characters around and Angela is definitely one of them. “The main thing is that she is relatable,” says her friend and colleague Tulip Siddiq, Labour MP for Hampstead and Kilburn. Seated behind her desk in a short-sleeved checked dress, Rayner is ebullient, passionate and down-to-earth, coming across as one of the few politicians in an otherwise capable but dull shadow cabinet who might actually be fun to hang out with. “I’ll definitely be deputy prime minister, otherwise Keir’s got trouble,” she joked to Andrew Marr last October, describing herself as “John Prescott in a skirt” to Keir Starmer’s Tony Blair. ![]() If the current opinion polls hold steady and Labour avoids a major scandal or the announcement of any radical policies that frighten off swing voters – both of which are unlikely given their leader’s unwavering commitment to extreme caution – the country should just about be ready for Angela Rayner to become the second most powerful person in the country after the next general election. One wall is filled with ephemera, both personal and political, and on another, a red Perspex sign reads: Ready for Rayner. ![]()
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