types of candidates are already presenting themselves: backbench disruptors and ministerial loyalists.
A frustrated party is letting off steam, tired of No 10’s refusal to take their concerns on board. Starmer will have to hope the lid doesn’t come off as he is forced to confront the scale of his own unpopularity – both in party and country.
By Tuesday morning, three had declared publicly. Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson announced her candidacy – promising to unite the party, deliver for working people and take the fight to Reform.
She also mentioned her past as “proud working-class woman from the North East” – three attributes which have emerged as defining characteristics of this contest. And she emphasised her union links by making a speech to the Trades Union Congress, a conference Starmer has snubbed this year.
Meanwhile, Bell Ribeiro-Addy entered the race as the backbench voice of the party’s disaffected left, accusing Starmer of “haemorrhaging votes” to Labour’s political rivals.
The Clapham and Brixton Hill MP said Labour members were unhappy with her party’s approach to the conflict in Gaza and cuts to the winter fuel allowance and welfare – and called for Labour to do “so much better”.
Among the horse trading and meetings to see if rival candidates could be persuaded to fall in behind a colleague on Monday, the soft and hard left of the party were both desperate to keep each other neutralised. “We will probably all coalesce around one person” to stop the hard left from reaching the ticket, a Labour MP on the right of the party told The i Paper.
Emily Thornberry, chair of the foreign affairs committee, has also attacked Starmer, circulating clips of her on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg in which she said Labour needs to be “more confident” by “listening” as she gauged the measure of her support.
Thornberry and Starmer have form. After years of grind in opposition as Shadow Attorney-General, she didn’t make it into Government – the role went to Starmer’s old pal, Lord Hermer.
But there is another dimension to this contest: the Watford Gap. Both the Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham – and former Labour deputy leader Baroness Harman – have called for a Northern woman to counterbalance Starmer and Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy, both lawyers and London MPs.
Thornberry and Ribero-Addy also represent London constituencies, putting them at a disadvantage as that consensus grows.
“I think without being disrespectful to some brilliant women in London who are standing – like Emily Thornberry, who I’ve got a lot of respect for – I can well understand why lots of my colleagues are saying we should have a Deputy Leader from outside London to broaden perspectives; broaden the base,” Health Secretary Wes Streeting told LBC on Tuesday morning.
Former Transport Secretary Louise Haigh and backbencher Dr Rosena Allin-Khan did not press ahead with their candidacies after taking soundings over the weekend and on Monday. Haigh was widely viewed as ineligible after her departure from Government over a fraud conviction from over a decade ago.
On Sunday, Burnham backed Lucy Powell, who represents Manchester Central. By Monday, she was enjoying widespread support from colleagues in Westminster.
“Lucy has been really generous with her time to everybody and she’s quite popular in the PLP, people like her – and she doesn’t have a scandal. Quite frankly, at the moment, being somebody who Keir fired – but not for scandal, for whatever else – is not a bad place to be when you’re going out to the membership,” the MP added.
Powell is understood to be angry at being sacked on Friday, with sources suggesting she had clashed with Starmer’s chief of staff Morgan McSweeney. Allies say she has also been underestimated as a political operator.
Meanwhile, as Leader of the House of Commons, Powell popped up every Thursday to take questions from MPs – ranging from rural broadband and primary school libraries, to market town business concerns. MPs often take their question and subsequent answer from the minister as proof to their constituents that they are raising local issues.
square LABOUR PARTY All the contenders to replace Angela Rayner as Labour's deputy leader
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“It sounds so ridiculous from the outside, but doing Business Questions every week and giving colleagues the clips they can whack on socials and to the local paper about the issues in their constituencies has won Lucy loads of support,” another Labour MP explains. “People who I’ve been speaking to, who wouldn’t ideologically be Lucy-leaning, are very pro-her.”
Powell’s election would also ensure Burnham gains an ally on the national executive committee, which one day may have to adjudicate on his return to parliament that must come before any leadership bid.
Nominations opened on Tuesday, with the result of the election process announced on 25 October. Candidates will have a hustings on Wednesday and will have until 5pm on Thursday to win the support of 80 MPs to be nominated.
Already, left-wing Labour MPs Richard Burgon and John McDonnell have warned the short time frame was a stitch-up, as the socialist wing of the party rushed to see whether it can muster enough support to field an acceptable candidate.
Some inside the party spent Monday questioning whether it was worth standing at all, given suggestions from senior Government sources that whoever wins could be sidelined.
A Labour MP was pithy: “There’s no point standing for it, it’s a job with no power anymore,” they said, because Lammy has already been appointed deputy prime minister.
“No 10 will probably wait and see who it is and then decide whether it’s someone reasonable they can deal with,” a Labour source said.
In the meantime, Labour high command is wondering just how much damage to the party’s reputation any internecine squabbles can cause between now and the announcement of the winner in seven weeks’ time.
“It may seem short, but that’s a lot of news cycles between now and then,” one Labour insider sighed.
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