Jo Cox’s sister: Why I want to fight her old seat for Labour
JO COX’S sister wants to be the Labour candidate in a by- election for the seat previously held by her murdered sibling.
Kim Leadbeater is seeking the party’s nomination for the Batley and Spen constituency five years after the mother-of-two was killed.
A by-election is being held after Tracy Brabin, who succeeded Mrs Cox, was elected as the West Yorkshire Mayor in last week’s local elections. Labour’s business spokesman, Ed Miliband, yesterday said Miss Leadbeater ‘would be a great candidate’.
Mrs Cox had been the Labour MP for Batley and Spen for just over a year when she was killed in Birstall in the West Yorkshire constituency. The 41-year- old was shot and stabbed by farRight extremist Thomas Mair on June 16, 2016, just days before the Brexit referendum.
After her sister’s death, Miss Leadbeater, 44, threw herself into promoting causes Mrs Cox had been passionate about and was awarded an MBE in the New Year’s Honours.
She founded the Great Get Together, helping people to connect with each other in communities, and is an ambassador for the Jo Cox Foundation.
Miss Leadbeater said last night that she had been ‘moved by how many local people from across the area’ had contacted her to ask if she would stand and had decided to seek the Labour candidacy following a ‘lot of soul-searching’.
She told a local newspaper: ‘I would love to represent this extraordinary, vibrant place that I have called home all my life.’
Miss Leadbeater said she had ‘never really seen [herself] as a political animal’, but added: ‘Through all the work I have done with Jo’s foundation over the past five years I have met so many truly fantastic people from across this area, some of them Labour, many not involved in party politics at all.
‘This community picked me up when I needed it most and I will be forever grateful.’
The date on which the party’s candidate will be announced and the date of the by-election are still both yet to be decided.
Labour’s Miss Brabin held the constituency with a majority of just 3,525 over the Tories in 2019, meaning it will be a tight contest. The Conservatives managed to overturn a similar majority of 3,595 in last week’s Hartlepool by-election, going on to win by 6,940 votes. Recriminations con
‘A lot of soul-searching’
tinued yesterday over Labour’s dismal local election results.
Tony Blair warned the party could cease to exist as he savaged Sir Keir Starmer. Mr Blair, the last Labour leader to win a general election, said the party needed a ‘total deconstruction and reconstruction’.
And Labour’s last prime minister, Gordon Brown, said Covid restrictions had hindered Sir Keir’s ability to communicate with the public. ‘He’s got to be given time to fight the next election, and he will do so in my view,’ Mr Brown told Times Radio.