Labour ‘need to move headquarters out of London’ , MP Nandy warns
of the leading contenders to replace Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the Labour Party has said they need to move their headquarters out of London
Wigan MP Lisa Nandy, a former shadow energy secretary, said she is “seriously thinking” about running as a candidate to take over from Mr Corbyn after the disasterous defeat in the General Election.
And she has called for Labour’s headquarters to move out of London in order to reconnect the party with voters outside of the capital.
Ms Nandy told The Andrew Marr Show on the BBC that there is a “very, very hard road” to regain the trust of Labour voters in towns across the north of England.
“I think it’s right to say that we need to be much more rooted in those parts of the country. I think that goes beyond the leader though,” she said. “There’s absolutely no reason why decision making is concentrated in central London.
“Our Labour headquarters, in my view, should move out of London, our regional offices should be empowered to take real decisions, we should move our party conferences back to towns as well as cities.”
Ms Nandy said it is “undoubtedly true” that Mr Corbyn is to blame for the devastating defeat but said it was not a rejection of the ideas in the Labour manifesto.
Instead, she said: “We’ve got to rediscover how we can earn people’s trust in order to make that radical change that the country needs.”
Ms Nandy said that she would consider again voting for Boris Johnson’s Withdrawal Agreement Bill as long as it does not guarantee a hard Brexit.
“I will vote for it on the basis that he and his team are willone ing to consider options like a customs union at committee stage – that was the basis on which I voted for it last time,” she said.
“And I have reached out to members of his team. I would be surprised, to be honest... I think we are looking at the hardest of hard Brexits and I will not vote for that,” she added.
She said there would be a “fair process” to find a new leader.