Corrie’s Nicola backs Corbyn to bring sunshine back to seaside
A FORMER aide to Boris Johnson standing as an MP has previously blamed immigrants for bringing germs and HIV to the UK and accused Muslims of divided loyalties.
Labour called on the PM to prevent Anthony Browne from contesting the seat of South Cambridgeshire after his “shocking” and “despicable” writings from 2002 and 2003 came to light.
CORONATION Street star Nicola Thorp backed Labour to revitalise depressed coastal communities again as she met Jeremy Corbyn in her hometown of Blackpool yesterday.
The 31-year-old campaigner, who has played Nicola Rubinstein in the ITV soap since 2017, was back a stone’s throw from the candy rock factory her grandfather Bill set up in 1969 as she sat down with the party leader.
Mr Corbyn backed Nicola’s plea to boost seaside towns – slapping new regulations on cramped, unfit “houses of multiple occupancy”.
She said: “B&Bs are owned by private landlords, who often live offshore and aren’t aware of the conditions their tenants are living in.
“I visited one weeks ago and we weren’t even allowed to walk all the way inside it because it wasn’t deemed safe enough.”
Mr Corbyn – whose party is carrying out a policy review of seaside towns – also suggested that ailing Victorian resorts could be revived with new arts projects and funds from offshore wind farms.
Nicola became a Labour backer after failing to vote in 2010 because of “anger and confusion and misrepresentation”. She now lives on a houseboat so she does not have a legal postal address. Instead, she has to cast her vote in her hometown, where dad Geoff, mum Jan, both 61, and brother Dave, 29, run the factory making Blackpool rock.
Dedicated Nicola was not ruling out standing as a Labour MP herself one day – as long as it is in the Lancashire town.
She said: “It’s not a never, of course! I’m positive. Never say never. It’s really important that younger people, particularly younger women, get involved with politics.”
In their joint interview with the Mirror, Mr Corbyn – who will be 75 by 2024 – said he will “absolutely” stay the full five-year length of a Parliament as PM if he wins the election, insisting: “I’m fit and healthy and very happy.”
In Corrie scene with co-star Sue Cleaver 1
Unemployment in Blackpool South is 8.5% – more than double the national average.
Knife crime in Lancashire doubled in five years – to 981 offences in 2018 – as the county lost more than 500 police officers since 2010.
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Just 3% urgently referred for breast cancer symptoms were seen on time at Blackpool Teaching Hospital between April and June, the Health Service Journal says.
A YouGov poll last night put the Tories 14 points ahead of Labour.
But Mr Corbyn said: “I never comment on opinion polls, I only comment on the prospects of success – and they are very, very good.”
He would not confirm if Labour will keep its 2017 vow to end free movement for EU citizens after Brexit, simply saying “ask me after Saturday” – when Labour’s factions will agree the manifesto.
But signalling a far softer approach than the Tories, he said: “We depend on a lot of European workers in this country.
“And a lot of British people depend on being able to work and travel in Europe.
“I don’t want to take those opportunities away from either group.”
Nicola spoke to the Mirror two weeks after opening up about life with borderline personality disorder in a bid to help others.
She told us she was wrongly diagnosed with bipolar disorder and “heavily medicated” in 2012 before finally being diagnosed last year. “I thought I was going crazy,” she said.
“It was through that diagnosis and being linked with other people with similar diagnoses that I felt normal again and felt like I was in control of it again.”
Blackpool council cut another £9million from its budget in the last year and was set to axe 45 jobs after being forced to reduce spending by £142million since 2011.
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The manager of volunteer-run mental health service Counselling in the Community ended up selling his car this year to keep it open, saying many clients could not afford the £5 suggested donation.