The probe into the Labour deputy leader’s Angela Rayner’s living arrangements in the 2010s involves at least a dozen officers and is examining “a number of assertions,” according to Greater Manchester’s Chief Constable Steven Watson
Watson speaking on BBC Radio Manchester yesterday local radio yesterday Watson said there were “a number of assertions knocking about”, and the force would “get to the bottom” of them.
Mr Watson told BBC Radio Manchester on Tuesday: “We, on an initial assessment, made a determination that it was unlikely that we would pursue an investigation on the provision of further investigation or further information.
“We have reassessed that decision, and we have announced that we will launch a formal investigation. That is a neutral act – it does not imply that the information gives us any hard and fast evidence upon which to base anything at this stage.
“It is simply we have an allegation. We are going to get to the bottom of what has happened, and we’ll work out where we go with it.”
The Sunday Times revealed at the weekend that a former aide had given a statement to GMP contradicting her claim that for five years her primary residence was around a mile away from her husband and three children.
The row concerns her buying bought a former council house in Vicarage Road, Stockport, in 2007 for a discounted price of £79,000 under the right to buy scheme.
She then declared the property as her principal residence on the electoral register until she sold it for a profit of £48,500 in 2015
The MP is facing questions over whether she had moved to her ex husband’s address in Lowndes Lane, a mile away, after the pair married in 2010 and which address she used on the electoral papers prior to being elected an MP in 2015
