Nuttall could help Ukip take
string of seats from Jeremy Corbyn’s party in the north of England, says senior
Labour MP
The
new Ukip leader, Paul
Nuttall, is a “game changer” for Labour and could
realistically oust a string of MPs in the north of England, Frank Field, the
Labour former minister, has said.
Field,
the MP for Birkenhead and chair of the House of Commons work and pensions
committee, said Labour needed an urgent strategy to deal with
Nuttall’s succession to the Ukip leadership, as he will appear to many voters as
a man who is “on the right page at the right time”.
Nuttall,
a former history lecturer from Bootle, Merseyside, has rightwing views on crime
and immigration without predecessor Nigel Farage’s background as a privately
educated London commodities broker.
“Farage
picked up a million Labour votes by accident but with this guy it is all he’s
going after,” Field said. “It is about culture, identity and family and so on.
The party centrally hasn’t got a clue. There are one or two people taking about
it but whether they seriously realise what is coming is another
matter.”
To
those in Labour who say Nuttall poses a similar threat to Farage, Field said
they “couldn’t be more wrong – it is game changing to Labour”.
“Ukip
under Paul will become the English party,” he said. “I don’t think it will be a
wipeout on the scale of the SNP but I do think they will be taking Labour people
out in our northern heartlands.
“Last
time, Ukip gave seats to the Tories. This time they will take
some themselves. If we say it will be the same as [Ukip under] Farage, we have lost the plot.”
some themselves. If we say it will be the same as [Ukip under] Farage, we have lost the plot.”
It
is understood Labour plans to fight Ukip under Nuttall by attacking his record
on wanting to privatise the NHS. Labour leadership sources said the strategy
would be to relentlessly highlight Nuttall’s past praise for privatisation,
which he has now disavowed.
Immediately
after Nuttall’s election, dozens of Labour MPs tweeted a video showing Nuttall
criticising the “monolithic” NHS and suggesting it could not survive in its
current form.
However,
Field, who has long held that Ukip is a threat to Labour and campaigned for the
UK to leave the EU, said the NHS strategy would be “water off a duck’s
back”.
“Labour
voters aren’t interested in this kind of old politics. They will want someone
speaking centrally about themselves,” he said. “We might try to pin this on him
but he’s denounced it himself.”
The
Labour leadership is understood to be treating the threat of Ukip under Nuttall
seriously but does not consider it to be an escalation of risk compared with the
party under Farage.
While
Labour will want to keep the attention on health, Ukip and the Conservatives are
likely to try to move the conversation on to immigration, attacking the party
for not wanting to have extra controls.
But
Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary, has been clear that Labour must “hold
the line” by defending immigration and not allowing the party to become
“Ukip-lite”.
Stephen
Kinnock, Labour MP for Aberavon, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme on Monday
that the threat of Ukip “must always be treated seriously” as he argued the
party had made a mistake in allowing “nationalist and populist voices” to
dictate the immigration debate. Guardian.
