Hartlepool MP Mike Hill has resigned from his parliamentary seat with immediate effect. No reasons have been given publicly, but the now-former MP has been defending a sexual harassment claim.
Labour insiders say discussions are already underway among the party’s leadership about which right-wing former MP will be parachuted in, denying members a meaningful say yet again in who represents them.
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Uh oh, Smeeth?
It didn’t enter my head Ruth Smeeth may be considered for PPC. I was more focused on the return of D Miliband.
Berger?
Sabine, I don’t think so as Berger no only left the Party what stood as LibDem candidate at the last General Election. Under Labour rules she cannot be a PPC at this time.
Smeeth is more of a possibility but we are talking a North East constituency, so somehow I don’t see it.
Hope the local left organises and fight to get Laura Pidcock as PPC
Laura Pidcock would be a good choice, for the area, or someone like her.
If not – if they, just, decide to parachute someone in, and if it’s a straight fight between Labour and the Tories – Labour may get trounced.
Hill benefitted from the Corbyn ‘bounce’, in 2017, then – had Tice, of the Brexit Party, not taken votes off the Tories – he would have lost the seat, in 2019.
Evans and Starmer should start thinking about their excuses, now.
Rules get bent if it benefits the right wing.
Sabine – Or in the case of Salma Yaqoob the rules were equally flexible for the left.
What about Flint?
It will be interesting to see what kind of result a bye-election will throw up.
An opportunity for the members of Hartlepool to elect a PPC of their liking, Laura Pidcock comes to mind. If the expected occurs, they fail to elect as PPC Laura or similar and get a parachutist right winger as PPC, they could follow the advice of the Socialist Black Group.
It isn’t like the JLM didn’t withdrew its help at the last GE isn’t it? Time to prove that the left is able to learn lessons quickly.
What was his majority, please? I Can’t find it.
Michael, less than 4000 votes, 3595 votes to be precise.
Or David Miliband 🙁
3,000 odd – but this disguises the fact that the UKIP / Tory combined vote would have given a rightist majority if the vote had not been split. Here’s the Hartlepool Mail take; https://www.hartlepoolmail.co.uk/news/politics/hartlepool-faces-parliamentary-by-election-as-mike-hill-resigns-as-towns-labour-mp-3167438
Good analysis David. Hartlepool is ready to fall to the Tories. Only a Labour candidate of the stature of Laura Pidcock have a chance of keeping it Labour and even for Laura its going to be tough going.
Despite the combined assault of the Tories and the Brexit Party, Laura lost her parliamentary seat by 1,144 votes. She would be a candidate that the local wider left in the North East would put the effort to ensure that she gets elected plus Unite would most likely help with the funding of her campaign.
If a right winger gets elected as PPC, the Party can forget any financial help from Unite and most likely the broader Trade Union movement too.
As your analysis proves Hartlepool is ready to fall and it would need a hell of a lot of hard work to keep it Labour.
Hartlepool members (I live just down the road) have had to endure a lot over the years – dating from when Peter Mandelson was pushed into the place back in the 90’s. UKIP have always fanced their chances in a heavily insular community, but I feel that current is ebbing away. The local CLP is under a fresh and invigorated local leadership and I would back them in any wise choice THEY make or are allowed to make,. I would plump for a local man or women from the town if a suitable person presents themselves. Localism is important here.
Pidcock managed to lose a seat that had been solidly Labour for 70 years. She is electoral poison. Without Brexit party to split Tory vote a different quality of Labour candidate is needed. There is no chance of SKS allowing her to stand if Labour want a chance of winning. She is associated with crackpot Corbynism, indeed is the flagbearer in the NEC. We need to move on. You’ll be wanting to bring back to life Eric Heffer next and get him to stand. Let’s get real.
Who ever stands under the labour party, will lose.
What does labour stand for exactly? Why would working class folks choose the party that snatched defeat from the jaws of victory? Everyone can see that sausage jockey at the top is hopelessly crap, and he’s got better treatment by the media too. The previous MP being done for a sexual offence will help too.
Voting for labour is like trying to reuse a split condom.
The seat will go blue.
Syzqysue, somehow I don’t see David Miliband either as PPC. They are enough right wingers that wish to be leaders themselves. I don’t believe they are going to rush to get an obvious contender for the leadership and harm their chances.
Besides I doubt that David Miliband will want to stand, this seat that cannot longer be considered a Labour seat (less than 4K majority)
One think is for sure it would be a test as to whatever Labour under Starmer can retain the seat and increase the meager Labour’s majority.
I said David Miliband more in horror than seriousness. As you suggest, he wouldn’t put himself forward without being a dead cert to get in…. and swopping New York and a huge income for Hartlepool …
I don’t know anything about Mike Hill or the alleged harassment but I couldn’t help but notice that he was a former political officer for Unison. It has often seemed as if it is LW MPs who are accused of something .. most recently Claudia Webbe and Apsana Begum.
Unison is, generally speaking, the bulwark of right wing Labour.
So long as it brings a sweat on the knight and his misfits then a loss would be good because it will not be allowed for a real person to stand.just another muppet from the right wing and a shock loss blamed on Corbyn,AS or the windy weather….bring it on Labour heatlands…pidcock will never get a smell at it being the sensible option.
I agree Joseph, Laura would never get the approval of LOTO but it is up the members in Hartlepool. I hope they organise effectively and elect as PPC a socialist and in the process defy Starmer.
That would be a perfect “Hollywood ending”, Maria, but earlier this year Evans, Starmer’s henchman as “acting” general-secretary, has given himself the power- it’s not something he’s actually entitled to within party rules- to reject any candidate he does not approve of- so we can already assume that Evans, as long as he remains Starmer’s personal Lavrenti Beria and savior, will bar anyone but “moderates”-i.e., Tories- from being nominated as Labour candidates anywhere in the UK- and that Evans doesn’t care that this approach is going to kill Labour’s chances at the locals and make sure that no one under 50 or so- and few OVER 50- will vote Labour in any electoral contest Labour faces in the Starmer-Beria era.
Heartlands I meant and Hartlepool..has always been Labour,so I notice our resident right wing getting the excuses in early.
It is obvious someone like Laura Pidcock will not be chosen. It’ll be an MP who lost in 2019 from the right of the party.
BackofBeyond, the question here is: would a right wing MP who lost his/her seat in 2019 would take the chance of losing again in Hartlepool?
Because, numbers tell us that Hartlepool isn’t a safe Labour seat any longer and we know how much the right wingers like to parachute themselves on safe Labour seats and how is going to look if he/she loses again.
Hartlepool is too far from London so not possible to canvass daily and held a job in London. Plus the Party isn’t in a financial position to pay for help in the numbers likely to be needed.
Hence, it would be down to the local members that most likely know by now that their is a very good chance that Labour would lost the seat.
Thus, a likely PPC would be a young right winger looking to cut his/her teeth by getting the experience of what is going to be a very tough campaign, even when the most likely result is that Labour is going to lose this seat.
Hill was suspended from the Labour Party in September 2019 and had the whip withdrawn amid allegations that he sexually harassed a woman who worked in parliament.
But the Hartlepool MP, a former UNISON regional organiser, was readmitted to the party the following month, despite the allegations not being withdrawn. Hill strongly denies the allegations.
WHY?
Err because the election was on December 19th.
SteveH, could Hill be throwing a tantrum? Because if this is a tantrum he has timed his departure perfectly to inflict maximum damage to Labour’s chances of retaining the seat.
This isn’t another by-election, this is a by-election that will need to be fight alongside local and mayoral elections in May.
Hence, the resources that were transferred to the Peterborough by-election in 2018 aren’t going to be ready available for transfer to fight the bi-election at Hartlepool.
One thing Mike doesn’t do – and I speak from knowledge and experience – is “throw a tantrum”.I don’t intend to speculate as I jhave no knowledge of the internal dynamcs here. It would be helpful if others observed the same maxim.
You right wing clown Walsher .IF nobody “speculated” as you say,we wouldn’t have a comments section for your right whingers to spread your dross. …pathetic.!
Thanks for explaining David, I didn’t mean to disrespect Mike Hill at all. Only pointing out that if he is defying Starmer he has chosen perfect timing and he has my respect for it.
Agree that tantrum was a wrong choice of word my apologies.
Why would he throw a tantrum now, though? The party is doing everything he wants- abolishing internal democracy, ditching socialism again, purging socialists again- what could he possibly have to throw a tantrum ABOUT? You’d think he would see this all as heaven on earth.
Maybe Hill is concerned about the outcome of the investigation into his conduct.
You may recall how the people of Hartlepool elected H’Angus the Monkey as their mayor rather than the Labour candidate a few years back. Folk outside the North East may know of the old story of the unfortunate monkey that was the only survivor of a French ship that was wrecked off Hartlepool during the Napoleonic Wars and how the unfortunate animal was promptly tried and hung as a French spy by the good citizens of the town.(Well apparently it was wearing a little French uniform). Accordingly in later years the local football club adopted the monkey – a man in a monkey suit – as its mascot and when given the opportunity this chap stood for the post of mayor a H’ Angus the monkey pledging free bananas for all the children of the town (a pledge which to his credit he kept).
However many outside the region missed the real significance of the election to public office of a man in a monkey suit rather than the Labour candidate. This was in respect of the old saying up there “that you could put a Labour rosette on a monkey in a suit & people would vote for it”. It was fully intended to be a slight directed at the Labour Party. As if the loss of the election itself was not considered to be enough.
At that time the people in Hartlepool were rather unfavourably disposed towards their Labour representatives the most prominent of whom being their then MP Mr Peter Mandelson. It is alleged that the Mr Mandelson was not popular with the locals with whom he had very little in common – not being in the habit of keeping coal in his bath and the like. Being folk who had a history of taking direct action when provided with the opportunity they therefore demonstrated their displeasure with the Labour Party by electing the independent H’Angus as their Mayor as they did so on several other occasions .
It seems to have been a lesson for Labour that it never learned.
Thank you Albert for you comment, I didn’t know any of it but really enjoyed this bit of local history of the North East.
Superb account Albert Swift. Though aware of the Monkey being elected, i was unaware re the historical detail you share. Brilliant+++ Love the breaking away from the “rules”, the metropolitan set who set rules and breaks them as suits them. Thanks 🌟🌟🌟
Is this where Bliar makes his return to frontline politics ?
Regionals have been over-ruling CLP’s decisions/ selections lately so expect and dirty parachute to make its descent.
My first thought on seeing the OP on the main page was they’ll try to impose bliar jr.
Years ago he was touted for the vacant Bootle seat; they were roundly told to get bent. Whether Hartlespool’d follow suit, I don’t know….They had mandelson represent them for fair while; but on the other hand there was the monkey they had as mayor…They’re a strange lot around that way, it would appear.
Blair never left Foggy. His fingerprints are all over every bit of nastiness that has gone on to date but I know what you mean.
Do you really think he would try a comeback in Hartlepool or ear mark it for one of his children? The thought horrifies me but I think that no matter how arrogant and stupid Blair is- and he is supremely arrogant and foolish-he must know that he is detested by most people and would be wiped out if he ran in Hartlepool or any other constituency Labour held or not.
This vile man, responsible for so much carnage in the world, should just sit back with his equally vile money grubbing wife, count their money and evaluate their and their children’s property portfolios and other assets. They, like the Kinnocks before them, got what they wanted out of our party – they are all multi millionaires while many of our members who work hard for the party struggle to put bread on the table and keep a roof over their heads.
Smartboy – We’ll know by the weekend who the PPC candidates are
see my comment below at 7:05pm
He’d have to renounce his peerage to be eligible, wouldn’t he? I imagine they don’t let you just quit Club Ermine anytime you’d rather.
Ah, I see @Albert Swift’s beaten me to it… 👍
Balls up North?
Doubt it… The weirder than wee Steve h wrong’un seems quite content to do the rounds making an even bigger cnut of himself on z-list “celebrity” shows.
Toffee – How sweet of you, It’s gratifying to know that I am never far from your thoughts. 😘
Spare us your self-congratulatory garbage, you wearisome abnormality.
It wasn’t a compliment. Only a deluded narcissistic sicko like yerself could find being compared to balls in any way complimentary.
Toffee – Oh dear.
Hartlepool United had a ballot to decide on the name for the monkey mascot. H’Angus was not the name that received the most votes. A rather vulgar name won with more than 50% of the votes cast. A copy of the video of Starmer’s greatest moments for s/he who discovers the name.
Remember when Screaming Lord Such defeated Dr David Owens Social Democratic Party in the 1990 Bootle By Election this finished the SDP. Here is the 3rd Earl of Harrow.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2ZsWENob1s
I reckon if he was still alive he could be Starmer the empty suit with eyes like piss holes in the snow.
I love it how Corbyn still manages to boil the piss of the Starmeroids on here……Another safe Labour seat heading for the Boris Brigade unless the local CLP manages to get their choice.
Ah yes how to wind up a Hartlepudlion just mention monkeys and hanging, as someone who was born and grew up down the road in Stockton-on-Tees we had great fun mentioning monkeys as often as possible. The whole NE seems to have turned Tory which is ridiculous after what Thatcher did to the area and the amount of cash the EU pumped into the areas and they voted Brexshit, A quote from my late mother who worked in a Co-op on possibly the worst council estate in SoT a customer came in and said ” We have to vote Tory from now on because my husband has been promoted to foreman ” .?.. seems the attitude has spread.
Here’s the timetable for Hartlepool’s PPC selection.
Applications open
Freeze date for eligibility – Tuesday 16 March
Applications close – Wednesday 17 March, 5pm
NEC longlisting – Thursday 18 March
NEC shortlisting – Thursday 18 March or Friday 19 March (depending on availability)
Online selection hustings – Friday 19 March or Saturday 20 March (depending on shortlist date)
I wish the CLP well in its choices.
Hopefully, though, by now it realises how its 2019 “unanimous” decision to nominate Starmer and Rayner has caused the partyi many problems, electoral, motivational and organisational
I suspet it sees and experiences it daily. The rest of us do.
No takers so here’s the answer.
The name that won hands down and was replaced by H’Angus was ……. Smack.