A senior Labour MP is set to launch a by-election “defeat tour” to find out why the party has slumped in recent ballots.
Vernon Coaker, the former schools minister under Gordon Brown, is preparing to return to Sleaford and North Hykeham, where he oversaw a by-election campaign this month, to seek residents’ opinions on why the party plunged from second to fourth place in the vote.
He also hopes to visit Witney and Richmond Park, the sites of two other recent by-elections in which Labour performed poorly. In addition he will travel to areas where Labour used to win seats but has seen support diminish in recent years, such as Kent, where the party haemorrhaged seven constituencies in 2010.
Working with local Labour parties, he will set up street stalls in coming months and produce a report on his findings. He hopes to feed into the party’s policy development and complement the more formal report on immigration being led by fellow Labour MP Yvette Cooper in her capacity as chairwoman of the Commons home affairs committee.
Mr Coaker said: “This is a listening exercise. I want to return to Sleaford and North Hykeham, an area that has not traditionally had huge Labour representation, bar the odd councillor, and talk to people there about why they don’t see Labour as relevant or a viable option.”
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The former frontbencher, who was shadow Northern Ireland secretary but quit Jeremy Corbyn’s team in July, added: “I know some people will say there are obvious problems with Corbyn, but I think there are deeper and wider challenges for Labour in a social and economic context.”
He will focus on residents’ views on Brexit, immigration and the future of work in the UK, and how voters view Labour’s stance on these issues.
Mr Coaker said he wanted to investigate what people mean when they call for control over immigration and will seek to talk to employers of migrants and migrants themselves.
Labour needs to emphasise the difference between freedom of movement, asylum and immigration from outside the EU, which “all tends to get mixed up” at present, he said.
“A big challenge is how to do this so it’s not a gimmick but is meaningful. How can we use this to change things?” he said.