U.K. Labour Party Deputy Leader misrepresents past voting record on unilateral nuclear disarmament

Context

Ahead of the U.K. general election on July 4, Labour Party leader Keir Starmer unveiled the party's plan for national security, dubbed the Trident "triple lock." Trident refers to Britain's nuclear weapons system and includes four nuclear-powered Vanguard-class submarines armed with ballistic missiles.

On June 3, the Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, Angela Rayner, stated on X (formerly Twitter) that she "never supported unilateral disarmament." She described the nuclear deterrent as "more important than ever in a world where Putin's war is on Europe's doorstep." Rayner is the Labour Party candidate for Ashton-under-Lyne.

However, Logically Facts found that Rayner did support unilateral disarmament by voting against the renewal of the Trident nuclear weapons system in 2016.

In fact

Parliament voting records from July 18, 2016, reveal that Rayner was one of the 48 Labour Party members voting against the renewal of the Trident missile system.

The "no-vote" was affirmed by Rayner on multiple accounts. On July 19, 2016, the Labour candidate posted on X: "Lost vote 472-117 on Trident renewal, I stand by my vote against…" In 2020, Rayner wrote on the Labour Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament website: "I want a world without nuclear weapons and that's what I want a Labour government to work towards. When the last Tory government tabled their motion to renew Trident in the House of Commons, I voted against it."

On June 3, 2024, Rayner stated: "I haven't changed my mind. The vote that we had some years ago mentioned nothing about multilateral disarmament and what I feel is really important for the long term is that globally we should be looking at disarmament of nuclear weapons, but that has to be done in combination with other countries", the Guardian reported.

Rayner also restated her support for the Labour Party's current "nuclear triple lock" policy.

The verdict

In 2016, Labour Deputy Leader Angela Rayner did support unilateral disarmament when voting against the renewal of the Trident, the U.K.'s nuclear weapons deterrent. Rayner's vote against the renewal was repeated on her X account and in other online contributions. Therefore, we have marked this claim as false.