A ROW has erupted over Labour blocking Left-wing candidates from standing in the next general election. Former MP Emma Dent Coad was stopped yesterday from running as the candidate in Kensington. She won the seat from the Tories in 2017, but lost in 2019 by 150 votes.
Dent Coad told us today she “wasn’t really given a fair go” by Labour’s selection panel, and was read “a list of my sins” at a selection meeting last week. She said some of the allegations against her were inaccurate, and blamed “machinery around” leader Keir Starmer for the decision. Dent Coad claimed one of the panelists on the National Executive Committee who blocked her had liked a post by one of her opponents on Twitter, which she said was “grossly unfair”, “particularly given somebody had gone through everything I’ve said for the last 15 years”. Last year, she said Starmer’s Labour was “toxic” and didn’t know what it stands for now.
The former Kensington member of parliament said she was “gutted, but also a realist”. She said she always supported the Labour leadership over the years, despite often disagreeing with it, and added: “I was a very loyal member but I do speak out when I see fit and clearly I should keep my mouth shut some times.” Dent Coad said would get behind the Labour candiate who is “most likely to win”, arguing they should be from the area. “I don’t think they’re going to vote from people outside when they don’t know anything about them apart from their naked ambition” she said.
Those shortlisted include Mete Coban, a councillor in Hackney, and Joe Powell, who set up Kensington Against Dirty Money and works for the Open Government Partnership, an organisation founded by Barack Obama. Also running are Stephen Cowan, head of Hammersmith and Fulham Council, former bus driver and now local Labour deputy leader Kasim Ali, and Salman Shaikh, founder of The Shaikh Group, which aims for better dialogue in the Middle East and North Africa.
Dent Coad is respected in the Kensington area for her support for the victims of the Grenfell tower fire. She believes the unequal constituency is a “microcosm of everything that’s wrong with the Tory party and in the country”, which she argues in her book One Kensington. Another Left-wing candidate, Maurice Mcleod, was blocked from standing in Camberwell and Peckham at the weekend.
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