Quote of the day
After 18 months of your leadership, our movement is more divided than ever and the pledges that you made to the membership are not being honoured. This is just the latest of many.
Andy McDonald’s blistering assessment of Keir Starmer’s leadership in his letter of resignation from the post of shadow employment rights and protections secretary.
Tweet of the day
From Jon Trickett, Labour’s former chair:
A constituent of mine says ‘Marcus Rashford has done more for working people than Keir Starmer’
— Jon Trickett MP (@jon_trickett) September 27, 2021
I can’t say I disagree.
Debate of the day
With Labour facing an uphill battle to win the next general election, delegates in the main conference hall debated whether the party should back scrapping the first-past-the-post electoral system and moving to a form of proportional representation instead. The motion said the current system “privileges ‘swing voters’ over neglected voters – including younger, black and minority ethnic communities”, creating “widespread disenfranchisement, disillusion and disengagement in politics”.
But Margaret Clarke, of the GMB union, who spoke against the proposal, said it would be an unnecessary distraction and had been proven to be unpopular with voters, having been rejected in a referendum in 2011.
The day in a picture
Row of the day
Some Labour figures feared the conference had already been overshadowed by internal wrangling over party rule changes and Angela Rayner calling Tory ministers “scum”. However, their frustrations reached new heights after Andy McDonald announced he was quitting the shadow cabinet.
McDonald said it was because Starmer’s office had instructed him to argue against a national minimum wage of £15 and against statutory sick pay being raised to the living wage, which he refused to do. He said it was important to raise awareness of the true value of the work done by low-paid workers. “To have the Labour party – the party of working people – fail to realise that is a bitter blow,” he said.
McDonald was one of the few remaining shadow cabinet ministers who served under Jeremy Corbyn, and some centrists will not mourn his departure. Charlie Falconer, the shadow attorney general, told the Guardian the timing of the move was “undermining” and clearly “problematic” for Starmer.
Tuesday’s highlights
Labour will try to steer attention back to its policies by devoting Tuesday to the issue of public services. The centrepiece will be the shadow home secretary Nick Thomas-Symonds’ speech on neighbourhood policing, with further addresses to the conference hall from the shadow health secretary, Jon Ashworth; the shadow education secretary, Kate Green; the shadow justice secretary, David Lammy; and the shadow child poverty secretary, Wes Streeting.
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