How I will rebuild trust in Labour and lead party back to power – Lisa Nandy

WHEN I launched my campaign to become Labour Party leader with the Wigan Observer, my local paper, the response was mixed.
Lisa Nandy is standing for the Labour leadership.Lisa Nandy is standing for the Labour leadership.
Lisa Nandy is standing for the Labour leadership.

There were those that thought we’d ‘missed an opportunity’ – but for me it was important. Not only because I wanted the people of Wigan to know first, but because I know how important local and regional media is to communities like mine.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

National media can often struggle to speak to towns like Wigan. Journalists often ‘need’ to be based in London or other big cities – either because that’s where the jobs are, or it’s where the institutions and organisations that influence national stories are based.

Labour leadership candidate Lisa Nandy is bidding to become the first female leader of her party.Labour leadership candidate Lisa Nandy is bidding to become the first female leader of her party.
Labour leadership candidate Lisa Nandy is bidding to become the first female leader of her party.

But it’s often local and regional journalists, embedded in and part of our communities, who are really able tell the stories of our lives.

The Yorkshire Post is a glowing example of that.

After the devastating election result for Labour, many of us were heartbroken that places like Dewsbury, Don Valley, Rother Valley and Grimsby had been
lost.

Four candidates - Lisa Nandy, Rebecca Long-Bailey, Emily Thornberry and Sir Keir Starmer - are competing to succeed Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader.Four candidates - Lisa Nandy, Rebecca Long-Bailey, Emily Thornberry and Sir Keir Starmer - are competing to succeed Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader.
Four candidates - Lisa Nandy, Rebecca Long-Bailey, Emily Thornberry and Sir Keir Starmer - are competing to succeed Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader.
Hide Ad
Hide Ad

These were all places with a long and proud tradition of supporting Labour – but too many lifelong voters felt they simply couldn’t at this election. As one person said to me on the doorstep before the election: “I haven’t left Labour. Labour’s left me.”

Too often people told me they simply didn’t trust Labour to deliver on our election pledges, or worse that we didn’t understand the challenges facing their communities.

We had some fantastic policies 
in our manifesto – an integrated and locally-directed bus network being
one I know would make a huge
difference to towns like Wigan and others across the North – but we didn’t communicate them well enough and people simply didn’t trust us to deliver them.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

In local government, Labour councils in town halls right across the country are showing the difference we can make to people’s lives.

But if voters are going to trust us to govern in Westminster, it starts by rebuilding trust in the communities we’ve lost.

Labour needs to rediscover the ability to speak for communities from Harrogate to Harrow – to find the common values and shared principles that have helped us unite our country and form a majority Labour government just three times in the last 100 years.

That’s why I’m standing to be the next leader of the Labour Party.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Not just to rebuild that ‘red wall’ of Labour seats in the North, but to rebuild the ‘red bridge’ that can bring together voters in communities from Lewisham to Leeds.

I believe that begins by taking power away from Westminster and Whitehall, and putting decision-making power closer to people’s lives.

‘Take back control’ was the most powerful political slogan of my lifetime.

It resonated with people in places
that felt they no longer had the
power to protect the things that mattered to them – crumbling public transport links, dying local high streets and too many young people forced to move away for jobs, education or training opportunities.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

It has been happening for decades – and we have to start listening.

If I’m elected to lead the Labour Party on April 4, we will listen.

We will put power back in the hands of people to protect and rebuild their communities.

To seize the opportunities that
they understand best, and to tackle
the challenges they know how to overcome.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

It is a different kind of leadership,
 and it means a different kind of
 leader.

I don’t look or sound like any leader of the Labour Party we’ve had before and electing me will be a brave choice for Labour members to make.

But I believe that, together, we can rebuild that trust and create a country that reflects our potential.

Lisa Nandy is a Labour leadership contender. She is the MP for Wigan.