Class warrior Bridget Phillipson’s family made 900% profit on council home as Kemi Badenoch savages Education Secretary’s politics of envy

Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson is at the center of a new ‘class war’ row over the government’s plans to block council tenants’ right to buy a home after her family benefited greatly from the policy.

Labor MPs expressed their anger last week when Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch branded Ms Phillipson a ‘vindictive class warrior’ over her attack on private schools.

Undeterred, the Conservatives last night stepped up pressure on the Cabinet minister over Labour’s housing policies, which they see as a fresh attack on aspirations.

Ms Phillipson’s family used a right-to-buy scheme to buy the council house she grew up in, later selling it for a profit of more than 900 per cent. But Labor is now largely cutting off access to the scheme, leading to accusations that senior figures like him are ‘pulling up the drawbridge’ after taking advantage of the policy.

Conservatives claim that the law currently passing Parliament is another example of ‘one rule for themselves, another for everyone’.

In an unusual debate in the House of Commons last week, Ms Badenoch took aim at the Education Secretary over his imposition of VAT on private school fees, which has been blamed for the closure of more than 100 institutions.

The Tory leader angered the Labor frontbencher when he said of Ms Phillipson: ‘She taxed private schools to get more teachers, but there are fewer teachers. ‘The appointment of a spiteful class warrior as Minister of Education has proven to be a disaster.’

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer later tried to defend Ms Phillipson by citing her past, saying: ‘She knows exactly what it means to grow up in poverty… She was once reluctant to tell her story but I know her story and it is an incredible story of social mobility and success.’

Image: The terraced house he grew up in, which his mother Mary was able to buy outright under Margaret Thatcher’s right to buy scheme

Ms Phillipson often speaks of her working-class roots, speaking of growing up in a ‘tough street of council houses’ in the North East and having to sleep fully clothed in winter because there was no heating upstairs in their house.

In 1990, when Ms Phillipson was six, her mother Clare bought the two-bedroom council house where they lived in Washington, Tyne and Wear, for £9,600; this was a 38 per cent discount from the £15,490 market value. The vehicle remained in the family’s possession until it was sold for £99,950 in May 2023; This meant a profit of more than 900 percent.

The property is set amid Victorian terraced houses and was described as ‘beautiful’ and ‘delightful’ by estate agents when it sold.

But Labour’s Social Housing Bill, currently making its way through Parliament, will reduce the number of families who can follow in the Phillipsons’ footsteps.

Among a range of measures, the legislation will increase the length of time tenants must live in the property before they can exercise the option to buy from three to ten years. Discounts will start from just five percent of the property value and go up to a maximum of 15 percent. Ministers say measures to increase the social housing stock are necessary. They are expected to reduce sales from 8,200 a year to around 850, a drop of about 90 percent.

The new rules were first put forward by Angela Rayner in 2024 when she was housing secretary. Ms Rayner personally benefited from the right-to-buy scheme – first introduced by Margaret Thatcher’s government – when she bought her council house in Stockport, Greater Manchester, at a discount and sold it eight years later for a profit of £48,000.

Last night, Tory leader Kevin Hollinrake said: ‘Once again Labor has been caught red-handed displaying the spiteful hypocrisy of class warfare.

‘They are gutting the same right to buy scheme that Bridget Phillipson and Angela Rayner benefited from, removing the drawbridge after they too benefited from it. As always in the Labor Party, it’s one rule for them and another for everyone else.’

Ms Phillipson was photographed wearing her school uniform, her school’s black blazer, cardigan and red-and-yellow striped tie.

Thanks to Thatcher, Mrs Phillipson’s mother was able to buy the two-bedroom house from Sunderland Council (Image: Inside the property)

The Education Minister said the house (pictured: kitchen) was ‘stuck between a disused railway line and an industrial wasteland’. He added that it was ‘not a desirable place to live’

Meanwhile an ally of Bridget Phillipson said: ‘This says it all that the Tories have chosen to attack a strong working-class woman from the north-east; This is pure snobbery, plain and simple.

‘The public will see these depressing, personal attacks for what they are.

‘The Conservatives are staring at the brink of electoral oblivion. They have nothing to give to this country other than hatred and division.

Ms Phillipson said the council house was ‘a terraced street wedged between a disused railway line and an industrial wasteland’ and said: ‘It was not a desirable place to live. People didn’t want to be there and the houses were in pretty bad shape.

‘We had no heating upstairs; the windows were rotten. ‘In winter I would go to bed fully clothed.’

However, when it was put up for sale, the listing described the property as a ‘beautiful Victorian terrace’, with photographs highlighting the ‘unique combination of character and modern comfort’ available to potential buyers.

Ms Phillipson told how her mother struggled to raise her on her own after her father abandoned the relationship before she was born.

She said: ‘There was no childcare and my grandparents were working so they helped as much as they could, they couldn’t look after me. So that meant he couldn’t work full time until I started school.

‘And that had a huge impact on us as a family. If you already have a single parent and you’re dependent on that parent as the breadwinner, if they can’t work, then that pushes you into poverty and we’ve experienced that too.

‘Although we were going through difficult times, there were children on my street who were in much more difficult situations. And I feel incredibly lucky to have gotten to where I am, to have received an excellent education, and to be able to give a voice today to children and families who are going through what I’m going through and who expect better from us as a country.’

But although the right-to-buy policy helped the family’s social mobility, Ms Phillipson said of its political architect: ‘I didn’t miss anything about Margaret Thatcher. How could I do that, given the damage he had caused?’

The Education Secretary referred to Ms Badenoch’s past when responding to her last week.

Writing on social media, she accused the Conservative leader of having ‘lost her head’ and added: ‘I wonder what it is about a working-class woman who is so hated by the Conservatives, who has made record investments in state schools by ending tax breaks for private schools?’

Ms Phillipson attended the St Robert of Newminster Catholic comprehensive programme. Students in church secondary schools perform better, on average, than students in ordinary general education schools.

Ms Phillipson was one of six people accepted to Oxbridge in her year and went on to study modern history and modern languages ​​at Oxford.