Labour pro-Europeans suffer defeat as conference fails to vote for debate on Brexit – UK politics live

Anneliese Dodds, the Labour party chair and shadow secretary for women and equalities, used her speech to confirm that Labour will force “every political party to publish data on the diversity of candidates for parliamentary elections in the UK, Scotland and Wales”.

The move was first announced yesterday, and Labour will do it by enacting section 106 of the Equality Act, which has not been implemented. The information published will be anonymised.

Dodds said this would make parliament more diverse.

Labour shadow ministers ‘petrified’ of taking supportive stand on immigration, lawyer claims

Rajeev Syal

An immigration lawyer targeted by an inaccurate dossier sent to right-leaning newspapers has criticised Labour’s leadership, including Keir Starmer, for failing to offer her personal support because they are “petrified” of provoking criticism over immigration issues.

Jacqueline McKenzie, the head of immigration at Leigh Day and a partner at the firm, told a Labour fringe meeting at the party’s annual conference that she had received much more support from Tory MPs than Labour MPs after Conservative party HQ had sent a briefing to the Daily Telegraph, the Daily Mail, the Sun and the Daily Express that was intended to whip up ill-feeling towards her.

She told delegates:

I actually got more messages of support from Tory MPs than I got from Labour. I didn’t get anything from our leader.

I get hate mail, Twitter has been a nightmare, I’ve had somebody outside my house. It has been awful.

She said she had received messages of support from Anneliese Dodds, the shadow secretary of state for women and equalities, and the MP Bell Ribeiro-Addy. She went on:

[ Starmer] could have sent me a little note. David Lammy [the shadow foreign secretary] who calls on me all the time for information on Windrush and stuff could have sent me a little private note. But he didn’t. They are too petrified, and the polls are not showing they need to be as petrified. Let’s be brave, let’s open our hearts and our homes, possibly, and our country to people.

McKenzie was speaking alongside Stephen Kinnock, the shadow immigfratiion minister, at a fringe meeting on immigration.

Ben Quinn

David Lammy, the shadow foreign secretary, has told a fringe meeting that it’s not possible to get married again without even going on a date, when asked about a future Labour government’s approach to the European Union.

Europe has been potentially one of the most awkward topics at conference for the Labour leadership, who will have been sighing with relief after an attempt to put forward a motion committing a Keir Starmer-led government to forging closer ties with the EU was not selected in a ballot as one of the 12 topics that will be the subject of a priority motions debate. (See 3.44pm.)

Lammy told a fringe meeting organised by Politico:

We have had a very very bitter divorce with the European Union, which went on for years and years. You could argue that it only came to an end with the Windsor Framework.

No one in this room would suggest in all seriousness that you can have a divorce and get married again without even going on a debate.

He said the “starting point” for a Labour government would be to get back to being the strong partners that Britain and other European states had always been.

Severin Carrell

Michael Shanks, the newly elected Labour MP, has told the party’s annual conference that his byelection victory last Thursday was built on two years of work to make Scottish Labour electable again.

He said voters were listening to the party for the first time in a decade, because Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, had transformed the party’s electability and Ian Murray, until last week the sole Labour MP in Scotland, had put in “an incredibly tough shift”.

Speaking for the first time at conference since winning 58% of the vote in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West byelection, he told a Labour Friends of Scotland fringe meeting:

We had no idea we would get anywhere near the swing that we ended up with. [People] were listening to us for the first time in a very, very long time. And if you’ve chapped doors in Scotland over the past 10 years, really, it’s not always been a very warm reception. And that changed. Hugely.

I mean, we’d be walking down the street with people peeping horns and the reaction of Scottish Labour activists was to sort of duck and cover, but actually it was thumbs up for the first time in a very, very long time.

And I think that’s really a shot in the arm for the Scottish Labour party that not only did we win our byelection, but people all across Scotland are listening to us again and want to be persuaded by our message. And it is a message of change.

[I] think we really need to recognise the leadership of an Anas Sarwar because the Scottish Labour party before he took on the mantle of leadership was not in a place where people could put their faith in us and this byelection was not won in the six months that we’ve been fighting it, it was won in the two years of really, really hard work to build back to a place where people can trust the Scottish Labour party.

Labour close to overtaking SNP in voting intention for Scottish parliament, poll suggests

Severin Carrell

Scottish Labour has edged much closer to the Scottish National party in voting for the devolved Holyrood parliament, according to a fresh Panelbase poll, leading to predictions Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, could form a minority government in Edinburgh.

The poll for the Sunday Times puts Scottish Labour on 32% in constituency seats for the Scottish parliament, three points behind the SNP on 35%, in the first published since Labour’s “seismic” victory in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West byelection on Thursday.

Conducted between 2 and 5 October, in the days preceding the Rutherglen result, Panelbase’s poll also found Labour edging slightly ahead on the regional vote, at 30% to the SNP on 29%.

Although the next Holyrood election is not due until 2026, the Sunday Times quoted Sir John Curtice calculating Labour would thus win 42 seats against 43 for the SNP. It reports that if the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats swung behind Labour, Sarwar could form a minority government, edging out the SNP, even if the pro-independence Scottish Greens won the 15 seats the model forecasts.

The poll also found Labour would struggle to overtake the SNP in Westminster seats, if the general election were held now. It puts the SNP on 37% and Labour on 33%, figures which could translate into 26 seats for the SNP and 22 for Labour.

Those data underscore Labour’s caution about over-stating the significance of the 20% swing it enjoyed in Rutherglen and Hamilton West, when Michael Shanks won nearly 59% of the vote on a low turnout. Crudely, that swing would translate into 40 Westminster seats in Scotland; Scottish Labour sources believe that is an overestimate. They believe the party is now in contention in about 28 Scottish seats.

Braverman’s immigration speech reflected xenophobic views of some voters, says Stephen Kinnock

Rajeev Syal

Labour’s shadow immigration minister has said that part of the UK’s electorate have “xenophobic” views.

Speaking at a fringe event at the conference, Stephen Kinnock criticised remarks made by Suella Braverman, the home secretary, in various speeches she has made in recent weeks. He told a Hope Not Hate panel:

It was a new low – I say that resignedly, as we’ve seen many, many new lows.

We ain’t seen nothing yet. They will stop at nothing to divide our communities and find issues that they think will fire up their base. Their policies on asylum and immigration are being driven entirely by Machiavellian policies.

There are segments of the electorate that have very progressive views on immigration, there are segments of the electorate who want a controlled and compassionate approach … I’m afraid there is a segment of the electorate which, I’m afraid, is xenophobic and has a view on immigration that is essentially reflected in what Suella Braverman said.

Labour could extend criminal sanctions for polluting bosses beyond water companies, Steve Reed suggests

Helena Horton

Shadow environment secretary Steve Reed has proposed tougher sanctions for CEOs of repeatedly polluting companies, making them personally criminally liable for the pollution they cause.

When asked at an event hosted by think tank Onward whether he would extrapolate Labour’s policy of criminalising water company bosses to all polluting companies, Reed said:

I think that is what you need. Where you’ve got such widespread law breaking, which is what’s going on there, I think you have to take action of that kind and I see this as fundamentally very pro-business as well.

It’s very pro-business because, you know, good decent businesses, the vast majority of businesses operate within the legal regulatory framework. That’s the level playing field that makes business and the economy work properly.

If you get some businesses that can get away with breaking the law, or making additional profits that way, then you haven’t got a level playing field. So it supports business by stopping businesses that are breaking the law from having that advantage.

Helena Horton

Shadow enviroment secretary Steve Reed has been doing his first discussion at Labour conference and he dismissed the claim made by Claire Coutinho at Conservative conference last week about Labour planning a meat tax as “fake news”.

He also said that Jacob Rees Mogg’s comments about hormone-injected beef are great for Labour’s election chances: “They should put that on a poster: ‘Hormone-injected beef – vote Conservative.”

Neil Kinnock and Alastair Campbell have lost. (See 12.35pm.) Brexit has not been chosen as one of the 12 topics that will be the subject of a priority motions debate. The leadership did not want a debate on UK-EU relations, which would have led to a vote on a modest strengthening of links with Brussels, and the Labour pro-Europeans who were lobbying for a debate did not have the clout to out-vote activists voting for topics more palatable to Labour HQ.

Although a better relationship with the EU is official party policy, Keir Starmer is wary of doing or saying anything that will allow the Tories to claim he wants to reverse Brexit.

The six topics chosen for debate by the constituency Labour parties are: Ethics and integrity in politics; NHS fit for the future; Energy; Ukraine; Defence;and Violence against women and girls.

And the six topics chosen by the unions are: Critical infrastructure; Industrial strategy, education and skills; Social care workforce; Challenges facing retail and the high street; New Deal for working people; and Technology and AI in the workplace.

Delegates voted during the day in a ballot that closed at 2.30pm and the results were announced to the conference later. In the hall officials did not reveal how many votes the 12 “winning” topics received, and how many votes there were for the other 37 topics.

Just as Jeremy Corbyn is no longer allowed to stand again as a Labour MP, this vote is also an indication of who much the party has changed in recent years. Only five years ago Starmer, then shadow Brexit secretary, was wildly applauded when he gave a speech backing a second referendum on Brexit, with remain an option.

Many Labour activists are still strongly pro-remain. But they seem to favour winning the election even more.

About 15% of Londoners do not have suitable ID to vote in elections, according to research by London Labour, PA Media reports. PA says:

Young people and those from minority ethnic backgrounds are also five also times more likely to be turned away from polling stations, according to a new Electoral Commission report.

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan called for an end to the ID system, branding it a “cynical assault” on voters’ rights in response to the findings.

Polling by Opinium commissioned by London Labour showed 20% of people aged between 18 and 34 do not have the required ID, compared with 12% in the 35-49 bracket and 13% of 50 to 64-year-olds.

Separately, research by the Electoral Commission looking at the 2023 May local elections across England found 1% of non-voters did not cast a ballot because they went to a polling station without valid ID. But this rose to 5% among 18 to 24-year-olds and those from minority ethnic backgrounds.

Commenting on the London Labour research, Khan said:

People across London and the UK face crucially important elections next year. As things stand there’s a real possibility that thousands of voters will be turned away from polling stations through no fault of their own, which could affect the outcome.

The evidence is clear that it will be young people, ethnic minorities and those from poorer communities who will be affected most by this cynical assault on voting rights.

We simply can’t have a situation where thousands of people are locked out of the political process.

As national campaign coordinator, Pat McFadden is in charge of the messaging that the party will use when it campaigns in the general election. In his speech to the conference, he did not say anything newsworthy, but he did summarise crisply and eloquently the case the party can make. Here are some extracts.

Is there a single thing in Britain that is better after 13 years of the Tories?

Not the health service.

Not the transport system.

Not people’s living standards.

Not our standing in the world.

They haven’t made things better. They have taken the country backwards.

He ridiculed the notion that the Conservatives could be the party of change.

And now their plan is to admit this. To say that the Conservatives have messed up the country, but pretend the answer is five more years of the Conservatives.

“The Tories have failed so give us a fifth term in office.”

That’s their call to the nation.

The big claim is they are a force for change.

But cancelling stuff isn’t change.

It’s just cancelling stuff.

Michael Gove, the levelling up secretary (who is always fond of an intellectual challenge), sought to answer the ‘What’s got better under the Tories?’ question in his speech to the Conservative conference last week.

The prime minister is not the antidote to the chaos.

He is a product of the chaos.

He is only there because of it.

The country didn’t elect him.

The Tory party didn’t even elect him.

He had a choice when he became leader.

To change his party or to follow it. He chose to follow it.

What do we learn from our past victories?

Look beyond our own ranks. Reach out to those who have not always agreed with us, who have voted for different parties in recent years.

Combine the promise of the hope that inspires us with the discipline of tough decisions that is our inescapable responsibility.

And above all, fight for a better tomorrow not a better yesterday.

McFadden, who worked for Tony Blair when he was PM, seemed to be referencing primarily 1997, 2001 and 2005 when he spoke of past victories.

Unite and Unison are the two biggest unions in the country, and in the Labour party, but they don’t always see eye to eye. Unite strongly backed Jeremy Corbyn under its previous general secretary, Len McCluskey, and his successor, Sharon Graham, has been arguing that Keir Starmer should be more “bold” (by which she means leftwing). See 12.02pm.

Christina McAnea, the Unison general secretary, does not agree. Asked on Times Radio if Starmer was being too timid, she replied:

I don’t think he’s been timid. I think Keir’s got a laser focus on trying to win the next election. And quite frankly, I’m glad that we’ve got someone who’s got that laser focus in the Labour party.

I think if you read the Labour party manifesto, there’s lots of good stuff in it.

Does it go as far as the unions would like? Probably not. But then Keir Starmer is not out to just please the unions. He’s got to convince the country that he can run the government and that they’re a sensible party that will look after everyone and that it’s in our interest to get him elected.