Skip to main content
Work with the NEU
A touch of class: why Labour’s still losing
Starmer and his advisers are eager to address the working class as a ‘patriotic’ identity, rather than an economic group that will support progressive policies proposed by people like themselves, writes NICK WRIGHT
Labour Party leader Sir Keir Starmer and Deputy Leader Angela Rayner

LABOUR goes into the Batley and Spen by-election with high anxiety. The retiring Labour MP, the screen writer and actor Tracy Brabin, was elected in a surge of sympathy and solidarity following the murder by a far-right assassin of the previous Labour MP Jo Cox. She built on a solid 17,506 votes in the by-election to win 29,844 votes in the 2017 Corbyn surge.

Now Brabin has won a convincing victory in the election for mayor of West Yorkshire and is compelled to resign as MP.

There is the usual squabble about who should be the Labour candidate. The Labour hierarchy have imposed Cox’s sister Kim Leadbeater, who has been hastily enrolled in the party and “selected” in clear abandonment of any pretence that the rules for selection ­— which entail candidates having a solid period in membership — need are followed.

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
Similar stories
Chris Williamson
Opinion / 8 February 2026
8 February 2026

This by-election could plausibly see both Reform and Labour defeated — but splitting the left insurgent vote would put that at risk, argues CHRIS WILLIAMSON

Jeremy Corbyn
Your Party / 2 December 2025
2 December 2025

Your Party can become an antidote to Reform UK – but only by rooting itself in communities up and down the country, says CLAUDIA WEBBE

Jeremy Corbyn, with Zarah Sultana (not pictured) speaking at a discussion on Your Party, their new political party, at The World Transformed conference, at Niamos Radical Arts Centre in Hulme, Manchester. Picture date: Friday October 10, 2025
Your Party Conference 2025 / 28 November 2025
28 November 2025

With ‘Your Party’ holding its founding conference in Liverpool this weekend, JEREMY CORBYN speaks to Morning Star editor Ben Chacko about its potential, its priorities — and a few of its controversies too

Green Party leader Zack Polanski speaking during the Green Party conference at Bournemouth International Centre. Picture date: Friday October 3, 2025
Parliamentary Politics / 18 October 2025
18 October 2025

Now at 115,000 members and in some polls level with Labour in terms of public support, CHRIS JARVIS looks at the factors behind the rapid rise of the Greens, internal and external