Having billed the taxpayer £249 for a pair of noise-cancelling AirPods Pro earlier this year – and then refusing to apologise on the grounds that she “uses them four hours a day for Zoom calls” – Angela Rayner has now admitted to losing the luxury headphones on the train, and is hoping a good samaritan will return them. Confessing to LBC’s Eddie Mair, Rayner added that while the AirPods cost £249, her personalised name engraving was at least free:
“If anybody knows where they are, they were left on the train, and it did have my name on it. And I was kind of hoping they would come back to me.”
Unfortunately for Rayner, the phone line cut out just as she was about to justify the expense with the same “Zoom call’ excuse as before. Given how little she actually used the AirPods throughout the pandemic, Guido will be keeping an eye on her expenses to make sure she doesn’t try billing the taxpayer again…
Co-conspirators will recall AirPod-Gate earlier this year, in which a bunch of MPs (Angela Rayner, Matt Hancock, Peter Bone, Margaret Hodge) were found to have used taxpayer money to splurge on top-end Apple products. At the time, Angela Rayner defended her purchase of two pairs of AirPods Pro by claiming “on average I use [them] four hours a day now on Zooms”. Guido unearthed evidence which suggested this was untrue. In any case, at least she tried to explain why she needed £500 worth of noise-cancelling earphones. An alibi for her iPad Pro, Apple Pencil, and Smart Keyboard was less forthcoming…
Now Angela appears to have seen the error of her ways, with an update to her expenses page showing she’s finally reimbursed the cost of her various iPad accessories. The £256.24 total for her Apple Pencil, Smart Keyboard, and Smart Folio case was repaid earlier this month. The taxpayer is still footing the bill for her £1,900 iPad and £249 AirPods Pro, presumably because the lower-end tech couldn’t keep up with all that invaluable tweeting.
Following revelations that Angela Rayner used her expenses to buy top-of-the-range luxury AirPods, one taxpaying reader reported the Labour deputy leader to IPSA, rightly believing she had misused taxpayer’s cash. Guido can reveal the independent body has now carried out an extremely half-hearted investigation and found no problems with her cash splashing. Despite Rayner providing some of the weakest excuses imaginable.
On the AirPods, Rayner claims they were purchased for a member of staff who requested noise-cancelling wireless earphones compatible with an iPad, and that:
“most other earphones are not compatible and unfortunately cheaper brands that are available are not as efficient and do not work out cost effective, as these brands do not last as long and often break easily.”
It’s difficult to know where to begin; the idea that most other headphones aren’t compatible with iPads is demonstrably untrue, for starters the cheaper £150 AirPods that Hancock expensed are an Apple product. The claim most other brands break easily because they’re cheaper is also untrue. In particular, Guido doesn’t see the logic in Rayner citing lockdown as the reason to ensure staff “were provided with any additional equipment necessary for homeworking”, immediately after claiming her chief of staff required a noise-cancelling function to fulfil their duties whilst travelling. Something you’re obviously not doing during lockdown.
The complainant also asked about the expensing of a £70 velvet chair. Rayner claims this again was for a staffer, and it was chosen “to suit their particular needs and comfort”. Presumably their ‘need’ was to nicely decorate their home rather than get work done…
You can tell Rayner’s a grandmother – she’s a right pushover when you ask for treats…
Read the IPSA report in full:
Airpod-gate seemingly has no end in sight. Guido’s been looking over the latest expenses data dump from IPSA and can reveal former Public Account Committee chair Margaret Hodge is the latest MP to stick the luxury Apple goods on their MP allowance, along with a new MacBook totalling £1178.95. Guido would have hoped this multi-millionaire silver surfer, who used to be in charge of monitoring public sector spending, would have thought twice about such unnecessary spending…
Hodge’s rush to use her Covid-boosted expenses on expensive tech is mirrored by Tory MP Crispin Blunt, who’s put in a claim for some equally-expensive £135 headphones, and Greg Smith who very generously bought his two researchers brand new Macbooks for a total of £2,443.20.
The oddest tech spend Guido’s found so far is James Sunderland’s £245 splurge on an autocue teleprompter – something every other MP has thus far managed to successfully do their job without. Is Sunderland planning on also launching a rival to GB News?
