Oh no Rosie

[InandOutlander]

I'm so sad to see her go, she was the shining light within the Labour camp.

She may well have received lots of communications from elderly people in her constituency, and others, appalled that virtually the first announcement that Labour made once in government was to cut fuel allowances for pensioners. Not something they had thought they'd be voting for.

Her abstaining votes speak volumes though. In a dictatorial party where you have the Whip removed for voting with your principles (WFP and child benefit as examples), you're put in a difficult position.

I can completely appreciate why she abstained, rather than voting against, as she'd have wanted to control her exit.

I doubt she thought it would be this bad (i.e. she imagined she'd have free votes on matters she wanted to disagree with, reasonably or not).

I appreciate what people say about by-elections on resignation from the party you were elected with, but these are the rules which exist. And it's been like this for years. Lobby for a rule change if you don't like it.

Personally think the timing is brilliant.

Not principled enough to vote for the amendment and have the whip suspended though. 🤷‍♀️

Her duty to her constituents comes ahead of her duty to her party. By-elections are called when an MP dies, not when they switch party. Not that she has switched parties, she's an Independent now and says she will be guided by her Labour values.

And arguably, could a different Labour candidate have delivered that particular constituency?

Also the behaviour she objects to, the freebies, only came to light after the election. The policies she is most angry about, the benefit cap and the removal of the WFP have been announced recently as well.

She talked about a series of "last straws" - as a Labour loyalist, this would have been a very hard decision to make.

Basically we will have more of the same destabilising effects in our economy for years to come.

I appreciate what people say about by-elections on resignation from the party you were elected with, but these are the rules which exist. And it's been like this for years. Lobby for a rule change if you don't like it.

Duffield cannot say that she won't call a by-election because the rules state it's allowed, but complain about expensive declared gifts which are also allowed.

If morals state that you shouldn't accept expensive gifts, then morals also state that you should give your constituents a chance to reconsider their vote when you jump party ship after three months.

The policies she is most angry about, the benefit cap and the removal of the WFP have been announced recently as well.

The keeping of the two child benefit cap was well-known and well-discussed before the election.

I think the reason she persisted with the party so far was down to the fact she'd been a Labour supporter all her life, and as such the party belongs to her, and her constituents, as much as it belongs to Starmer. Why should she be hounded out by hateful trans activists and cold hearted fellow MPs on account of her convictions around women's sex based protections?

Given the recent turn of events - she was able to resign from a position of principal and strength.

WFA wasn’t known and obviously the freebie hypocrisy

Who is behind the removal of the WFA?

A woman of principles LMFAO. Got elected with Starmer’s Labour and then dumped the party as soon as she achieved her goal. Next stop GB News I expect to slag off the left. Yeah, principles sure.

Being a constituency MP is a job, not a present. If you take it seriously, which by all accounts she does, it's hard work as well.

And it is the two together that makes it so bad.

We are expected to believe that the PM can't buy his own glasses but those that have worked all their lives (mainly before the introduction of the NMW) and have the basic state pension are expected to have broad shoulders.

Yes it’s clear in her letter in the bolded parts in pp

If her principles were predicated just on getting into a position of power, then she'd stick around; but not if her principles are the traditional Labour principles of looking after those most in need, and acting with integrity.

It was never going to be any different sadly.

At every stage Starmer has shown his absolute unwillingness to listen to women's concerns. Like most 'good guys' he makes exceptions for lovely fragrant supportive ones like his wife and his friends.

But if you're a disabled single mum living in poverty and scared men will be doing your intimate care in the future - well you're not on his approved list!

Ok, sorry to get that bit wrong. But the point stands. Leaving something or someone is complicated, she may have been hoping against hope that the leadership would rethink, or consult backbenchers.

What was in her letter that was known before the election

Starmer's leadership style
Starmer not talking to back-benchers
Starmer not having much previous political experience
Starmer not speaking up about antisemitism in Labour while in the Shadow Cabinet
Starmer's treatment of Diane Abbott
Retaining the two child benefit cap
That tough decisions would have to be made post election due to the dire state of the economy

What wasn't known:
Means testing of winter fuel allowance
Accepting expensive gifts (although I'm not clear about this, don't they declare them every year?)
A couple of political appointments

What was absent from her letter:
Anything trans/women's rights related, which is odd given her very public position on this

Like I said, if anyone was surprised at Duffield leaving Labour, they weren't paying attention.

So why did she choose to stand on a Labour ticket given that in her letter she is confident that "My constituents elected an independent-minded MP who vowed to put constituency before party"? Why didn't she let them elect an independent MP who wasn't a member of any party?

I thought the Westminster system of government was pretty clear in that a voter would understand that a candidate can change party/become independent. They are expected to continue to work for the electorate on the issues they stated they were fighting for, but they could leave the party they were with.

Hence I was always under the impression you voted for the local candidate based on their local policies. It is like when people say, ‘I voted for x Prime Minister’, well, unless that PM is your local candidate, then no you didn’t. Because leadership spills happen rather regularly as we have seen recently.

So I am not sure that Rosie Duffield’s leaving the Labour Party should trigger a by election.

Am following this and can’t understand why Rosie is getting such a hard time - as we know from Brexit etc, you have more power when you have a seat at the table. Even if Keir and his cronies were excluding and isolating her, by being in the labour party there was still a chance that she could affect policy and build up support there, especially after the Cass Report.

Can totally understand why she would sit there and think WTF is she doing trying to get the party behind her on this when they are totally corrupt, hypocritical and intent on divisive policies that worsen the lives of our most vulnerable (the elderly’s winter fuel payment, diabled access to PIP/benefits, SEN children’s independent school fees being subject to VAT)… and yet just analysis of the cabinet members’ accounts show they all accept freebies. Freebies that benefit their families in ways that contrast distinctly to the impact of their policies on normal people.

After all, we’d all love to pop our kids in an £18m covent garden property to revise for their GCSEs, when many families I know are desperately trying to work out how they can afford to keep them in the independent schools they moved them to because there was little to no SEN provision in their local state school… and they can’t access it anyway because the state schools didn’t support the process to obtain an EHCP and neither do they have the £30-40k needed to fight the LEA on their own back.

Surely voting in line with what has been whipped is the right thing to do when a member of the party, with abstaining being the next best option. Voting against the whip is wrong, you are a member of the party.

If your abstention weighs heavy in you, and you look down the road and anticipate more abstentions that will also weigh heavy, you need to leave the party.

If she stood as a Labour candidate, thinking she might resign from the party, this would be wrong. She was elected as a Labour candidate, that is what her constituents voted for. However, if she is unhappy with 'off manifesto' issues and feels the manifesto and promises will not be delivered, or what people voted for in terms of government is not what people will get, her resignation is entirely reasonable.

Staunch Labour supporters will hate her actions and staunch Tories will love them and their biases will determine their interpretation of her actions. Plus ca change.

RD will know what pressure she is getting from her constituents and she will be reacting to that too

A lot of Labour members and voters are going to be furious with Rosie, because they still want to clng to the idea that Labour is going to be so much better in government than the hated Tories. There is still a lot of obvious quietness and excuse making as well as deflection going on. Nobody wants to criticise Labour.

Remember the many threads on here before the election, on which women who said they were going to spoil their ballots were castigated by those who insisted that they should still vote Labour, in spite of their serious misgivings due to their appalling treatment of women over standing up for their sex based protections and integrity?

Women were told that they would be responsible should the Tories be re-elected; that the Tories were heartless and bad for women - and that Labour were the only answer to the problems that women and the country at large were facing.

It was always clear that a lot of people were going to be very disappointed due to their high expectations for what Labour would achieve. What they didn't expect, at all, was that things would unravel quite so quickly.

For people who are long-term Labour members, it's an intense emotional commitment. Leaving the party is like leaving a marriage. I know Labour members whose party activity just seems to make them miserable, but I know they'll never leave.

The Conservatives tried to persuade Rosie to defect before the election. She wasn't having it. There are mercenaries in Parliament, but she's not one of them.

Honestly, this reminds me of the way Corbyn stans used to say Luciana Berger was asking for it.