STORY
Angela Rayner has warned that Labour must urgently change direction after what she described as a “historic defeat” in the local elections, saying the party is in danger of becoming “a party of the well-off, not working people”.
The former Deputy Leader of the Labour Party said many Labour councillors had lost their seats despite working hard for their communities, while the party had also lost council administrations and missed opportunities for further gains. She said the results showed that the Government’s current approach was not working and that Labour may now be facing its “last chance” to respond.
Rayner said the cost of living had been the dominant issue raised by voters, arguing that people had turned to “populists and nationalists” because Labour had not done enough to address pressure on household finances. She said living standards were barely higher than they had been a decade and a half ago, while ordinary people continued to feel that the economic system was “rigged against them”.
Her comments represent a direct challenge to the Prime Minister and the direction of the Government. Rayner criticised decisions such as cutting winter fuel allowance and said the Peter Mandelson scandal had exposed what she called a “toxic culture of cronyism”. She argued that Labour needed to return to its purpose as the party of working people and take faster action to make voters materially better off.