Keir Starmer will be ‘relieved’ at news of Angela Rayner’s split from Labour MP partner – after he sacked him from his shadow cabinet over unauthorised TV interview

• Split came as a surprise to some MPs who said they had seen couple ‘talking happily’ to each at Westminster

Labour Deputy Leader Angela Rayner has split up with her MP partner Sam Tarry barely six months after hailing him as her ‘soulmate’.

The two politicians are going their separate ways after Ms Rayner told friends that she wanted to start a new chapter.

The split came as a surprise to some MPs who said they had seen the couple ‘talking happily’ to each at Westminster.

The news also emerged as Ms Rayner, 43, intervened in the bitter internal Labour debate over Palestine, saying she ‘understands’ why some party colleagues have quit over the issue.

But she also backed Sir Keir Starmer’s call for ‘a humanitarian pause’ to the violence rather than the ceasefire demanded by Labour rebels.

Angela Rayner and Sam Tarry. The two politicians are going their separate ways after Ms Rayner told friends that she wanted to start a new chapter (File Photo)

The split came as a surprise to some MPs who said they had seen the couple ‘talking happily’ to each at Westminster (File Photo)

Last night, party insiders said that Sir Keir would be relieved the relationship was over.

The Labour leader sacked Mr Tarry as a shadow transport minister in July last year for giving an unauthorised TV interview from a picket line during rail strikes.

The 41-year-old was also deselected last year as the Labour candidate in his East London seat after a bitter local battle.

One Labour MP said last night: ‘Angie and Sam are on different political tracks. She’s the potential deputy PM in a Labour government and he’s been deselected, and is having to look for a seat.

‘There is an argument that Angie didn’t do enough to help there. But Starmer will be quite relieved as it could have raised difficult questions in the future.’

The relationship was first made public in January last year when Mr Tarry – then married to paediatric consultant Julia Fozard – was pictured leaving Ms Rayner’s flat one morning.

He was shown with what looked like a toothbrush in his coat pocket and shoelaces undone.

In April this year, Ms Rayner told a fundraising event that Mr Tarry ‘is one of the most kind-hearted, amazing individuals I know and he’s also my soulmate’.

Sam Tarry was deselected last year as the Labour candidate in his East London seat after a bitter local battle (File Photo)

She added that it would be ‘an absolute tragedy’ if he was no longer a Labour MP after the General Election.

But yesterday, a close friend of Ms Rayner told the Daily Mirror: ‘Sometimes people turn out not to be who you thought they were.’

Ms Rayner was noticeably absent from the first King’s Speech debate in the Commons last week but returned the next day to slam Rishi Sunak as ‘too weak to deliver the change the country needs’.

Friends told the Daily Mirror newspaper that she ‘put her secret heartache aside’ to take the fight to the Tories. Mother-of-three Ms Rayner, who had her first baby at 16 and styles herself as ‘Grangela’ after becoming a grandmother at 37, separated from her husband Mark Rayner in 2020.

A friend of Mr Tarry said last night: ‘Sam has been through a huge amount in his personal life and in Westminster over the past few years and will now have the time and space to focus on his own political projects.’

Source: Read Full Article