Labour leadership: Emily Thornberry tells members to 'get on with it' and nominate her

Labour leadership contender Emily Thornberry has told party members to “get on with it” and nominate her so she can secure a position in the final round of the contest.

It comes as the shadow foreign secretary’s campaign struggles to gain momentum, with less than two weeks remaining until she faces being eliminated from the race to succeed Jeremy Corbyn.

So far, her three rivals – Sir Keir Starmer, Rebecca Long-Bailey, and Lisa Nandy – have all passed the threshold and will go through to the members’ ballot.

But the Islington South and Finsbury MP has just nine of the required 33 nominations from Constituency Labour Party groups across the country and now has until Valentine’s Day to back her leadership bid.

“Well, I may be an excellent candidate, but I’m yet to get on the ballot,” she told party members at a leadership hustings in Cardiff. “That’s the truth. I’m as experienced as the other candidates, I’ve had seven front bench jobs, I’ve had two years shadowing Boris Johnson and I’ve torn him to pieces every time.” 

“Why don’t we give me a chance to be involved in this debate? I can’t do that if you don’t nominate me, so please will just get on and do it. 

Pointing to the other candidates, she added: “We should have a debate that has the widest possible selection for members, and given my foreign policy experience, given my security experience, I think I raise their game. 

“We should make sure our 600,000 members actually get a choice of four excellent candidates – why are we cutting it down to three? So please, would you just get on with it. Get on and nominate me.”

Ms Thornberry also challenged the other candidates to commit to resining as Labour leader if the polls and their colleagues tell them in several years’ time they cannot win a general election – something she has already pledged to do.

“I will never get in the way of a Labour victory,” she said. “If we are running up to a general election and I am a drag on the ticket, and less popular than the Labour Party having spent doing five jobs doing the worst job in the world – I would stand down, rather than be a drag on the ticket and rather than mean we would lose the general election. 

“That is the challenge I make to the other candidates because they should do the same thing too. This is not about a personal trip, this is about making sure we get into government.” 

During the hustings event, Sir Keir also indicated he would continue with Labour’s flagship taxation policy of increasing income tax on the top five per cent of earners in the UK – those with an income over £80,000 – if he is elected in April.

He said: “We need to start with a new economic model where those that can pay more, do pay more – the top five per cent. Where corporations pay their fair share. And where tackle tax avoidance.”

Earlier on Sunday, John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, also insisted that Ms Long-Bailey is the “voice that we need” to take Labour forward, as he joked he was attempting to ease himself into the “role of elder statesman”.

“I’ve made it clear I support Becky and Richard Burgon, they’re the nature of my politics and Becky was my number two if you remember in the Treasury team for quite a while,” he told the BBC’s Andrew Marr programme.

“She’s brilliant and I think she’s that voice that we need, that northern voice, a woman’s voice as well, that we need. However look at all the candidates, they’re terrific, what a fantastic new generation that’s coming forward. Any one of them will be a superb prime minister.”

Source: UK Politics - www.independent.co.uk