Labour has been warned the government won’t be trusted on renters’ rights after it emerged that MPs rake in at least £830,000 a year in rent.
Some 83 members of parliament earn a minimum of £10,000 from renting properties, according to the latest register of interests, with Sir Keir Starmer’s party leading the pack of mostly residential landlords.
The true figure which MPs earn from rent is unknown, but is likely to be higher than £830,000, as 170 registered properties have received rental income in the past year.
Campaigners said the number of landlords in parliament was “shocking” and called for greater scrutiny over what they described as a “blatant conflict of interest” when voting on legislation that would directly affect them.
High-profile ministerial landlords include chancellor Rachel Reeves and foreign secretary David Lammy. Ms Reeves moved to Downing Street following her new role in government.
It comes as the government reels from the resignation of homelessness minister Rushanara Ali, who quit over claims she evicted tenants from a property she owns and then increased the rent by hundreds of pounds.
She was accused of “staggering hypocrisy” as her department is bringing in legislation to ban landlords who evict tenants in order to sell their property from relisting it for rent for six months.
Ms Ali is not Labour’s only landlord, nor its most profitable. In fact, many of the most property-rich MPs are members of Sir Keir’s party, data from the parliamentary register of interests shows.
Tulip Siddiq, Labour’s anti-corruption minister who stepped down amid investigations she was gifted a flat by an ally of her aunt Sheikh Hasina, also declares rental income from two properties.
MPs have registered income from 170 properties across the UK, with at least £10,000 generated in yearly profits per landlord. But this is likely higher in some cases, considering that average monthly rents are £1,399 in the UK.
The majority of these (86 per cent) are residential properties, meaning they are being leased out to private renters, not businesses.
Eight MPs have declared that they have stopped receiving rental income at some point in the past year.
The figure does not include properties rented by some MPs who charge less than £10,000 a year, such as Sir Keir, who has previously revealed he rents to his sister.
The highest concentration of properties rented out are in London, Edinburgh, Guildford and Oxford, with Lib Dem MP Charlie Maynard declaring rent for a house in upstate New York. Some 82 of these are rented out by Labour MPs.
Ilford Labour MP Jas Athwal is the most prominent landlord in the Commons, renting 15 residential properties and three commercial, including a private care home. Mr Athwal’s rental earnings come alongside his MP salary of £93,904.
Mr Athwal came under fire soon after being elected, as his tenants claimed their flats were filled with black mould and ant infestations. He has since stood down from his role as a councillor in Redbridge.
The register also shows that one in five Tory MPs – 27 out of 121 – are also landlords, down from 83 in the previous parliament.
Former chancellor Jeremy Hunt is the Conservatives’ biggest landlord, taking rent from eight residential properties and one office building, partly through his property holding company Mare Pond Properties.
In 2023, flats owned by Mr Hunt in Southampton were reportedly rented out for £1,700 to £2,000 a month.
Tory MP Sir Geoffrey Clifton Brown is also the landlord of five residential properties, and was among a group of backbench MPs who were accused last year of signing amendments to gut the now-scrapped Renters’ Reform Bill.
The Independent has reached out to Labour, the Conservatives, and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government for comment.
Jae Vail, spokesperson for the London Renters Union, said: “The sheer number of landlords in parliament is shocking.
“During an unprecedented housing crisis, it’s a blatant conflict of interest that MPs are making millions from struggling renters — while some even use taxpayer money to cover their own personal rents. Tenants need a government that works for us, not one that profits from our hardship. Until parliament is free of landlord MPs, renters will not trust the government to deliver the bold action we need. It’s time for the government to ban landlords from parliament and start working for ordinary people, investing in council housing and capping rents.”
Tom Darling, director at the Renters’ Reform Coalition, said “it probably doesn’t reflect well on parliament” that so many MPs are landlords.
“In the longer term, renters risk losing confidence in a political system where those that extract rent from them are hugely overrepresented – and it certainly didn’t help the last government’s efforts to pass the Renters’ (Reform) Bill,” he said.
Rishi Sunak’s government was accused of watering down planned protections for renters in England, after some Conservative MPs raised concerns they would be too burdensome on landlords.
