Overview
- Late June press reports that Bridget Phillipson’s childhood council house was bought under Right to Buy in 1990 for £9,600 and sold in May 2023 for £99,950 have been used by Conservatives to accuse senior ministers of hypocrisy.
- Labour says its Social Housing Bill will tighten Right to Buy by raising the residency test from three years to ten and cutting discounts to between 5% and 15%, a change ministers say will cut annual sales from roughly 8,200 to about 850 to preserve social housing stock.
- The 20% VAT on private school fees was introduced in January 2025 to fund new teachers but critics link it to more than 100 independent school closures and dispute over whether teacher numbers have risen as promised.
- Phillipson called the attacks a ‘manufactured smear’ and pointed out that adjusting for inflation reduces the real‑terms gain from the sale to a much smaller sum than some headlines suggested.
- Coverage divides along political lines with right‑leaning outlets emphasising the ‘class warrior’ narrative and Labour and government sources stressing social mobility, housing preservation and the bill’s progress through the Lords as the next test.