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election night bright and early on Friday morning.
With the
Labour Party staring down the barrel of a heavy election defeat, questions over Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership are perhaps inevitably being asked.
John McDonnell, his shadow chancellor and long-standing ally, has said Labour will make “the appropriate decision” about Corbyn’s future once the final result of the election is known on Friday. McDonnell ruled himself out on Thursday evening.
So, if a dire outcome prompts the party leader to stand down, who would take over? Here are some names that have been touted. Rebecca Long-Bailey Another committed supporter of Corbyn, the MP for Salford and Eccles has been shadow business secretary for the last two years and deputised for Corbyn at prime minister’s questions earlier this year.
She is the bookies’ second favourite in the race to replace Corbyn, and the 40-year-old perhaps has a higher profile than others from a younger generation than Corbyn and McDonnell on the left of the party, such as Laura Pidcock.Angela RaynerIf the party is looking for a compromise between the defining Corbyn and Blair eras of its recent history, Rayner, 39, could be ideally positioned. They’d get a politician who has a back story, unlike most MPs.
The daughter of a mother with bipolar disorder, she became pregnant at 16 and left school with no qualifications. She’s talked about how Tony Blair’s Sure Start programme helped her get her life back on track as she raised her son alone. After studying part time, she became a council care worker and then Unison union rep before becoming MP for Ashton-under-Lyne in 2015.
When discussing the reasons for the party’s possible defeat in an interview with HuffPost UK: “I don’t think it’s because we’re too socialist, and I don’t think it’s because we’re not socialist enough.”Keir StarmerThe former director of public prosecutions is the clear favourite to replace Corbyn as leader. Starmer is the bookies’ 2/1 favourite, indicating he has a 33.3% chance of taking over.
Starmer, 57, is not a Corbynite (having backed Andy Burnham in the 2015 leadership contest, and Owen Smith when Corbyn was forced to seek re-election a year later), but has served in Corbyn’s top team as shadow
Brexit secretary.
The MP for Holborn and St Pancras’s successful efforts in getting Corbyn to back a second
referendum won applause from the Remain wing of the party, suggesting he could corral the competing factions.
However, the collapse of Labour’s support in Leave-voting areas may make the
London MP seem an inauspicious choice to some.Emily ThornberryThe shadow foreign secretary has been a longtime ally of Corbyn, but her shift towards an avowedly pro-Remain stance in the wake of the European election result found her out of favour with the leadership. She has repeatedly dodged questions about whether she fancies a go at the top job.
Thornberry’s pro-EU position could help with part of the grassroots membership when it comes to a leadership contest. But as MP for Islington South, Thornberry could struggle to make the case the party should choose another London MP as leader.Jess PhillipsThe outspoken MP for Birmingham Yardley has not kept her disdain for Corbyn’s leadership secret. In 2015 she said she would knife him “in the front, not the back” if she felt he was leading the party to defeat. In October Phillips said she “might” run in any contest. And she told The Times in March: “Why not? I think I’d be a good prime minister.”Yvette CooperIf election night disaster means the party shifts to the centre and becomes re-acquainted with Blairism, the former leadership candidate could be a contender again.
A minister under Gordon Brown and shadow home secretary in Ed Miliband’s opposition, Cooper, 50, has won plaudits in her high-profile role as chair of the home affairs select committee, particularly in scrutinising the government over the Windrush scandal.
The MP for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford was also touted as a temporary prime minister under a plan to convince Tories to collapse the government and prevent a no-deal Brexit.Related... Will
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