Starmer faces Labour Left backlash as flurry of moderate candidates announced
Sir Keir Starmer is facing a backlash from the Labour Left after the party announced a flurry of moderate candidates for the election.
Four young centrists have been picked to stand for Labour on July 4, prompting accusations that would-be MPs ideologically aligned with Sir Keir are being “parachuted” into parliamentary seats by Labour HQ.
The Labour leader has been accused of a “cull” of the party’s Left, with the row over Diane Abbott’s candidacy, the suspension of Lloyd Russell-Moyle, the MP for Brighton Kemptown, and the blocking of Faiza Shaheen, a Left-wing candidate.
Among Labour’s new cohort at the election is Luke Akehurst, a moderate member of the national executive committee and a long-time critic of the hard Left. Labour confirmed that he will stand in North Durham, replacing Kevan Jones, the outgoing MP.
Another is Josh Simons, the director of Labour Together, a think tank launched during Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour leadership to reinvigorate the party’s moderate wing, who will stand in Makerfield, previously held by Yvonne Fovargue.
Labour also announced that Heather Iqbal, a former adviser to Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, will contest Dewsbury and Batley, a new seat in Yorkshire and The Humber.
Georgia Gould, the leader of Camden council and the daughter of Philip Gould, a New Labour strategist, is standing in Queen’s Park and Maida Vale, another new constituency in London. All four were announced on Wednesday.
Responding to Ms Gould’s selection, Alistair Campbell, Sir Tony Blair’s former spin doctor, tweeted his congratulations, saying: “Your dad would be so proud of you.”
But the influx of moderate candidates, in a trend described as “the march of the Starm-troopers”, has prompted a backlash from the Labour Left.
A spokesman for Momentum, the Left-wing campaign group, said: “It’s back to the bad old days. Westminster insiders are being parachuted into seats they often have no connection with, while local members are denied the chance to pick their own candidates.
“Never mind that this is yet another promise broken by Keir Starmer. More significantly, it smacks of the entitled behaviour of New Labour, which saw millions turn away from the party in disgust at an arrogant political elite. Sadly, Starmer looks set to repeat the pattern.”
There was a particularly angry reaction to Mr Akehurst’s selection, with many taking issue with his stance on the Israel-Hamas conflict. Some claimed he had deleted reams of posts on X, formerly Twitter, in recent days.
Responding to the news that Ms Shaheen would be barred from standing for Labour, Ms Abbott tweeted: “Appalling. Whose clever idea has it been to have a cull of Left-wingers?”
On Wednesday night, Mr Corbyn warned Sir Keir that nothing would be achieved by “driving people out” of the party.
Left-wingers have claimed that they are being “purged”, with disciplinary cases blocking the path for some would-be candidates, often with trade union links.
But members of Sir Keir’s team argue that they play no direct role in the process, with both disciplinary and selection matters being handled by the national executive committee.
