Keir: Labour has mountain to climb
LABOUR leader Sir Keir Starmer acknowledged the party has a “mountain to climb” to rebuild trust with voters, as an opinion poll showed the Tories opening up a double-digit lead in the Hartlepool by-election race.
Ahead of tomorrow’s vote, the Survation poll for ITV’s Good Morning Britain put the Conservatives on 50% – 17 points ahead of Labour in a seat it has held since its creation in 1974.
Sir Keir, who has visited the constituency three times, said he is battling for every vote as he hopes Labour will not lose another seat in the party’s so-called ‘red wall’.
Defeat in Hartlepool – which Labour held with a majority of 3,595 in 2019 even as other bricks in the red wall crumbled – would be a blow to Sir Keir’s leadership.
“We lost very badly in December, 2019, and my job is to rebuild trust, and confidence and reconnection with the Labour Party, and that’s what I’m doing,” Sir Keir said. “That will take time, of course it will.”
On the campaign trail in North Wales, Sir Keir said: “The task I took on as leader of the Labour Party was to rebuild, out of the worst general election result since 1935, and put the Labour Party back in a position to win the next general election. And that’s a mountain to climb. We’re climbing that mountain, it has taken difficult decisions and I’m absolutely up for any further difficult decisions.”