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A Labor MP has resigned from the Commons, prompting a by-election that will severely test the party’s performance on its traditional “red wall.”
The Guardian understands that Mike Hill resigned as MP for Hartlepool while a parliamentary investigation into his behavior continues, and that he was told by party leader Keir Starmer that he needed to resign some time ago.
Conservatives in the north are confident they could seize the seat and add it to their list of constituencies that have elected a Conservative MP for the first time.
A Labor source said Hill “did the right thing and resigned” and that “it is right above all that any investigation is carried out in full and that justice is served.”
The date indicated by Labor figures as the most likely date for the by-election to take place is May 6, in line with other local elections.
Hill, 57, has been a Hartlepool MP since the 2017 snap election. He held onto the seat in 2019, but saw his majority cut in half, probably saved from being taken over by the Conservatives because the party Brexit stood up and split the vote in an area that 69.6% voted to leave the European Union in the 2016 referendum.
A worker at the Labor Party headquarters exposed the challenge the party faces in holding on to the electorate, admitting: “It will be really difficult. Maybe if we can convince Jeff Stelling to stand up, we would have a chance. “
Another party member said, “You don’t have to be a math genius to figure out that it’s going to be difficult for us.”
While by-elections are often a challenge for a sitting government, especially given that conservatives have been in power for 11 years and considering the criticism ministers have faced for their handling of the coronavirus pandemic, the change in Decades of traditional political dogma in the 2019 elections means conservatives. they believe that Hartlepool is now within their grasp.
“We should win it,” said a Conservative MP from the north, while another called the party’s chances “very good.”
But they said the uncertainty remains until Labor announces who their candidate is to take over from Hill. Laura Pidcock, the former MP from North West Durham who fell victim to the rise of Conservatives in the north of England, is one of the names being discussed.
Another is Paul Williams, another former Labor MP, wiped out by the tide of Red Wall Conservatives in 2019, who will become Cleveland’s crime and police commissioner this spring.
A GP, he is believed to be the favorite choice of the local party. A Labor source said: “He is a front-line doctor in a town where the hospital was cut off. It’s a pretty obvious fit. “
But conservatives say they have already collected records of their vocal support for another referendum posted on social media in the run-up to the last election. If selected, a conservative backbencher cheerfully said, “We have a library full of those.”
The labor sources refused to know who will be chosen. “There will be a party process,” they said.
Hill, who has yet to speak publicly about his resignation, is at the center of an ongoing parliamentary investigation into a sexual harassment allegation, which he has flatly denied. He was suspended from the Labor Party during an investigation in 2019, but the whip was reinstated a month later.
The court hearing on the matter is understood to be scheduled for May, the same month as the local elections.
In January last year, Hill failed in an attempt to prevent his name from being revealed in an upcoming labor court case report taken by a woman who accused him of assault and sexual harassment.
Hartlepool’s Labor Party has suffered a damaging split in recent years, in part due to disagreements between the Jeremy Corbyn-supporting left and the moderates. It has lost control of the city council, now run by former Brexit party councilor Shane Moore, and its number of seats has been reduced from 18 to just six on the 30-member council.
