Labour MP lays out the case for Jess Phillips as a "clean break" leader

4 January 2020, 08:10

The Labour MP for Wolverhampton South East thinks that Jess Phillips doesn't share responsibility for Corbyn's government and could beat Boris Johnson.

Speaking about Jess Phillips announcing her candidacy for the Labour leadership, Pat McFadden said that he's "very attracted to her candidacy".

He continued: "I I think she offers the cleanest break I can think of with the politics of recent years and I think she offers us the best prospect of beating Boris Johnson, which is what this is all about.

"It's not about who appeals to what faction or anything like, we've had far too much of that in the Labour Party.

"It's about who can be a clean break with the politics that led us to the worst results since 1935 and who can take us into the future against Boris Johnson.

"So, I think she really is a politician for today's times and she's she's a very attractive candidate."

Andrew Pierce asked her more about her being a "clean break candidate".

McFadden explained: "She's not been part of anything. She's not, by that I mean she doesn't share any of the collective responsibility for all the decisions that made up the Labour Party's leadership offer of recent years.

"So she is a clean break with that. I think that's an advantage, fankly, given where all that ended up. So she does mark the turning of the page of that and I think that's a good thing.She's also, you know, not a factional figure at all."

He explained that if Labour carry on with the pattern of "serial defeats" then they won't get to introduce the values the party was founded for.

The whole approach of Corbynism is "gone" and has "had its day", he argued.

Jess Phillips, he said, represents something "new" and would be a "good counter to Boris Johnson".