Why has Rosie Duffield resigned as a Labour MP?
Rosie Duffield has said she feels Labour supporters are being "completely taken for granted" after resigning from the party.
The MP, who will now sit as an independent, sent a letter to party leader Sir Keir Starmer on Saturday, decrying "cruel and unnecessary" decisions taken by the government affecting the "most vulnerable constituents".
Duffield attacked the prime minister's decision to keep the two-child benefit cap and means-test winter fuel payments, as well as condemning his handling of the outcry over gifts given to him and other senior Labour figures.
She accuses the prime minister having a "lack of basic politics and political instincts", and overseeing a wave of "sleaze, nepotism and apparent avarice" among his circle since coming into power on 5 July.
In an interview with the BBC's Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme, Duffield also suggests the prime minister has a "problem with women", adding: "It's very clear that "the lads" are in charge."
Here, Yahoo News takes a look at the criticisms facing the Labour Party which drove Duffield to resign.
Who is Rosie Duffield?
First elected in 2017, Rosie Duffield became Canterbury's first Labour MP since the constituency was formed in 1918.
She briefly served as a Labour whip in 2020, before resigning after admitting breaching COVID restrictions by meeting with her partner while they were living separately.
Duffield is known for an impassioned speech in the Commons where she described her experiences of an abusive relationship and controversial comments on the transgender rights debate.
In January 2022, Duffield reportedly said she had considering leaving the Labour Party due to “obsessive harassment” from current and former members, according to Politics.co.uk
Watch: Labour's Pat McFadden plays down Rosie Duffield's resignation
Earlier this year the MP said she had been "completely exonerated" of investigations into allegations of transphobia and antisemitism.
Duffield resigning the party whip means she will no longer be bound by Labour's rules or be forced to vote along party lines.
She will now sit as an independent in the House of Commons – but what prompted her to make this move?
'Cruel and unnecessary' decisions are 'not why I was elected'
In her letter, Duffield tells the prime minister that the "tough decisions" he frequently insists he has to make "do not directly affect any one of us in Parliament".
"They are cruel and unnecessary, and affect hundreds of thousands of our poorest, most vulnerable constituents," she says, adding that this is not the "politics of service" Starmer promised to deliver.
Referring to the government's decision to means-test the winter fuel payment, Duffield says: "Forcing a vote to make many older people iller and colder while you and your favourite colleagues enjoy free family trips to events most people would have to save hard for - why are you not showing even the slightest bit of embarrassment or remorse?"
As someone who joined a trade union in her first job at seventeen, a single mum, and a former teaching assistant in receipt of tax credits, Duffield said Labour had always been her "natural political home" – until now.
"I saw decisions about the lives of those like me being made in Westminster by only the most privileged few. Right now, I cannot look my constituents in the eye and tell them that anything has changed."
'The sleaze, nepotism and apparent avarice are off the scale'
Duffield also makes reference to the ongoing row over expensive gifts received by Labour's top team – which deepened after it emerged party donor Lord Waheed Alli was given a temporary Downing Street security pass after Labour came to power.
"Someone with far-above-average wealth choosing to keep the Conservatives' two-child limit to benefit payments which entrenches children in poverty, while inexplicably accepting expensive personal gifts of designer suits and glasses costing more than most of those people can grasp - this is entirely undeserving of holding the title of Labour prime minister," she writes.
"The sleaze, nepotism and apparent avarice are off the scale. I am so ashamed of what you and your inner circle have done to tarnish and humiliate our once proud party."
Watch: Rosie Duffield agrees Keir Starmer 'has a problem with women'
Asked about the clothing row on the BBC's Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme, Duffield said: "All of us had donations for the election - I didn't like it but I had to crowdfund because I got no money at all from the unions or the party this time, and you feel a bit grubby doing that.
"When you've got people with so much more money than the average person spending somebody's yearly salary on their own clothes without feeling that they have to apologise or explain - I just feel like I'm not getting anywhere with trying to get that from my leader, and I needed to go."
She said Starmer can "absolutely afford his own clothes" and that he prime minister "hasn't actually explained" why he thinks it's okay to accept such donations, accusing him and his circle of "mass hypocrisy".
Duffield says Starmer 'has a problem with women'
Asked by Kuenssberg if she thinks the prime minister has a "problem with women", Duffield replied: "I'm afraid I do yes."
She continued: "Most backbenchers that I'm friends with are women, and most of us refer to the men that surround him – the young men – as "the lads".
"It's very clear that "the lads" are in charge, they've now got their Downing Street passes, they're the same lads that were there briefing against me in the papers and other prominent female MPs. I was really hoping for better, but it wasn't to be."
In her letter, Duffield highlights the "deeply shameful" treatment of Diane Abbott, the first black woman to become an MP, who recently accused Starmer of treating her as a "non-person" and not providing proper support during a row over a Tory donor saying she should be shot.
"A woman of her political stature and place in history is deserving of respect and support, regardless of political differences," Duffield writes.
A 'lack of basic politics and political instincts'
Duffield also criticises Starmer's "managerial and technocratic approach", and "lack of basic politics and political instincts", claiming he has "never shown what most experienced backbenchers would recognise as true or inspiring leadership".
As someone "elevated immediately to a shadow cabinet position", having spent little time on the back benches, Duffield says it is unclear what Starmer's "passions drive, or direction" as a leader even were.
'Resignation coming for quite a long time', minister says
Pat McFadden, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, told Kuenssberg he was “disappointed” but “not surprised” by Duffield's decision, and rejected claims the government is not driven by public service.
"I think you can see she has been disillusioned with the party leader, maybe the party more generally, for quite a long time. I don’t think this is something that just developed in the last few months," he said.
Hitting back at criticisms over clothing donations, he said: "These are campaign donations, and presentation, whether we like it or not, is part of a campaign."
He said he is grateful to Waheed Alli, a long-time Labour supporter and donor, adding: "I think there would be more in this if there was any suggestion of giving X to get Y - but there is no getting Y here."
Other Labour MPs have gone further by actively criticising Duffield, with one backbencher calling her "poisonous" and saying the leadership were "at least doing something right if they never talk to her".
Relations between Duffield and the Labour leadership have long been strained, particularly on the issue of transgender rights.
Labour MP for Nottingham East, Nadia Whittome, tweeted: "Rosie Duffield has made a political career out of dehumanising one of the most marginalised groups in society. She should never have been allowed the privilege of resigning. Labour should have withdrawn the whip long ago."
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