PMQs verdict: Oliver Dowden delusional over the housing crisis trading barbs with Angela Rayner

Sitting in the press gallery of the House of Commons, I wondered if I had misheard Angela Rayner’s questions. Stepping in for Keir Starmer, while Sunak is away in Europe, the Labour Deputy Leader had asked Dowden about the government’s rental reforms and leasehold bill.

Campaign groups today accused the government of watering down its landmark bill for renters, and said its claims to ban no-fault evictions are in “name only”. Housing Secretary Michael Gove admitted these Section 21 notices may not be banned before the next election, despite forming part of the Tories’ 2019 manifesto.

Yet Dowden dismissed this, and important questions on leasehold flats, as “political opportunism”. Almost a million people have suffered no-fault evictions since the Conservatives first promise the ban - I doubt they’ll see Rayner’s questions as opportunism.

This was the Labour Deputy Leader’s most high profile appearance since the police opened an investigation into her. The Ashton-under-Lyne MP is accused of potentially breaking electoral law by failing to properly disclose her main residence in official documents. It comes as opposition figures have questioned whether Rayner should have paid capital gains tax on the sale of her council house before she became an MP.

And she tried to get on top of the scandal, by referencing it with her first question: “ Unsurprisingly Dowden went on the attack over the scandal immediately. The Deputy PM said: “I know this party opposite is desperate to talk about my living arrangements, but the public want to know what this government is going to do about theirs.

“Natalie from Brighton has been served with two no-fault eviction notices in 18 months, she joins nearly a million families at risk of homelessness due to his party’s failure to ban this cruel practice. Now instead of obsessing over my house, when will he get a grip an show the same obsession with ending no fault evictions.”

Dowden replied: “To begin with, it is a pleasure to have another exchange with (Rayner) in this House, our fifth in 12 months, anymore of these and she’ll be claiming it as her principal residence.” The PMQs stayed personal, with Rayner saying: “Has he finally realised that when he stabbed Boris Johnson in the back to get his mate into No 10 he was ditching their biggest election winner for a pint-sized loser?”

Dowden replied: “Of course, as ever, the deputy leader is always looking to attack others’ failures but never the one to take responsibility for her own. She once said you shouldn’t be waiting for the police to bang on your door, if you did it then you shouldn’t be doing your job. The right honourable landlady should forget her tax advice and follow her own advice.”

PMQs verdict - heated score draw between deputies

Increasingly, Rayner vs Dowden is far more interesting than the PMQs main event. And the Deputy Prime Minister referenced their now six clashes in the last 12 months with a gag, saying: “More of these and she'll be claiming it [the despatch box] as her principal residence.”

Both Rayner and Dowden cracked far better jokes than their bosses, with the Labour deputy referencing the astonishing story about Mark Menzies: “I was expecting a little bit better today. He’s a little bit worn out. Perhaps it’s all those 3am calls from the ‘bad men’.”

And her jibe at Rishi Sunak, calling him a “pint-sized loser”, led to awestruck looks across the press gallery high up in the House of Commons. However Dowden more than held his own, with some smart lines including a reference to the “Rt Hon landlady”. I’m giving the pair a score draw.

Ralph Blackburn is NationalWorld’s politics editor based in Westminster, where he gets special access to Parliament, MPs and government briefings. If you liked this article you can follow Ralph on X (Twitter) here and sign up to his free weekly newsletter Politics Uncovered, which brings you the latest analysis and gossip from Westminster every Sunday morning.