Angela Rayner mocks Rishi Sunak with Will Smith joke

Angela Rayner took inspiration from the words of Will Smith when she mocked Rishi Sunak over the decision to hold an inquiry into how his wife's "non-dom" status details were leaked.

In recent days, it was revealed that Akshata Murty was "non-domiciled" in Britain for tax purposes, meaning she by law is not required to pay UK tax on income from aboard - and Sunak also admitted to holding a US green card while as chancellor before he returned it last October.

As a result of the political scandal, Murty announced on Friday that she will pay UK taxes on future overseas earnings and for the last tax year because she didn't want the matter "to be a distraction" for her husband's position as chancellor.

A Whitehall inquiry has now been launched into how Murty's details were leaked to the media, first being reported by The Independent.

Since the details of Sunak's family finances have been revealed, Labour has accused them of avoiding paying potentially tens of millions in taxes while Sunak as chancellor announced tax rises for the public in his recent Spring Statement.

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Deputy Labour leader, Angela Rayner has taken to Twitter to get one up on the chancellor while also making a pop culture reference.

"Keep my wife's taxes out of your mouth?" Rayner tweeted, referring to actor Will Smith's words during his now-infamous Oscars ceremony appearance where he shouted at host Chris Rock: "Keep my wife's name out my f****** mouth."

This was moments after he walked up on stage and slapped Rock in the face for making a joke about the appearance of his wife Jada Pinkett-Smith who has alopecia. Smith has since apologised for his actions and resigned from the Academy, which has since banned him from attending their events for 10 years.

Rayner used this now infamous moment to joke: "Keep my wife's taxes out of your mouth?"

In a follow-up tweet, Rayner then added: "The leaking of any member of the public’s tax affairs is of course very serious, but he might just want to ask next door?"

Rayner has discussed Smith's slap on a previous occasion, where she told Sky News that "violence is never the answer."

"I get passionate and upset, we all do, but, you know, if I went over the despatch box and lamped Boris Johnson because I didn’t like what he said, because he offended me, then that would be completely unacceptable, and I think it was unacceptable that Will did that, so I think it was right that he apologised," she explained.

Funnily enough, Sunak himself also referenced Smith's slap when talking about the criticism his wife faced over having a 0.91% stake in the IT company Infosys which was founded by her father and had been continuing operations in Russia but is now closing its office in Moscow, BBC News reported.

In an interview on BBC’s Newscast podcast, he joked: "But I feel, on reflection, both Will Smith and me having our wives attacked – at least I didn’t get up and slap anybody, which is good."

Smith's slap has been watched millions of times all over the world, with remixes being made, even a game, and now its reached Westminster.

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