Every picture tells a story...of dull politics and egotism

As a row is sparked over whether Angela Rayner has or hasn’t hired someone to record her working life, Simon Mills hears how ‘tacky and tawdry’ it can be on the other side of the lens

- Simon Mills

If you thought Victoria Starmer’s recent, freebie frocks microscandal showed our first lady as a fashion-obsessed narcissist with the image-consciousness of a TikToking teenager, Angela Rayner is here to amp up the self-regard even further. It was reported on Monday that, like Boris Johnson, Rishi Sunak and Barack Obama (and Kim Jong Il) before her, the deputy PM and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government have engaged the services of a “vanity photographer”.

In his capacity as Rayner’s “official photographer”, snapper Simon Walker (formerly Sunak’s in-house smudger) is said to be getting an annual salary of £68k (of taxpayers’ money, mind) to follow the minister around and take pictures as she makes history and changes lives. Walker is posted at significant events and magical, socio-political, epochal instances like… well, Rayner kicking a football around with some kids on a council estate, her visit to London’s West End to discuss Oxford Street’s regeneration plans, and a myriad of hi-vis/hard-hat excursions to building sites and factory floors. And as with all second-tier, veep-ish adventures, this makes for some spectacularly underwhelming “content”.

Because this is grey-skied England, not sun-dappled America, and because Rayner is the deputy minister, not the actual prime minister, hers tend to be unimportant, insignificant, low-power, parochial moments, short on glamour, charm, impact and/or exposure. There is nothing to see here. Even less worth capturing on film and archiving for posterity. It’s of no interest to us and no use for the history books.

But just in case you were under the illusion this was just a vanity project for Rayner, No 10 is here to adjust the mood lighting, sorry, music for us. Walker is not Rayner’s “personal photographer”, Rachel Reeves snapped back on Monday – confirmation if it was ever needed that it is (show) business as usual.