MP Rosie Duffield says she is quitting Labour over leader Keir Starmer’s “cruel” policies and “hypocrisy” over his acceptance of gifts.
In her resignation letter, published by the Sunday Times, the Canterbury MP lambasts Sir Keir Starmer for the “staggering hypocrisy” of accepting gifts worth tens of thousands of pounds while scrapping the winter fuel payment and keeping the two-child benefit cap.
In the letter she said the “revelations of hypocrisy” since the change of government in July had been “staggering and increasingly outrageous”.
“I cannot put into words how angry I and my colleagues are at your total lack of understanding about how you have made us all appear.”
She added: “The sleaze, nepotism and apparent avarice are off the scale. I am so ashamed of what you and your inner circle have done to tarnish and humiliate our once proud party.”
She wrote: “Someone with far-above-average wealth choosing to keep the Conservatives’ two-child limit to benefit payments which entrenches children in poverty, while inexplicably accepting expensive personal gifts of designer suits and glasses costing more than most of those people can grasp – this is entirely undeserving of holding the title of Labour prime minister.”
First elected in 2017, Duffield’s decision to quit the party follows the suspension of seven other Labour MPs who rebelled on the King’s Speech by voting for a motion calling for the two-child benefit cap to be abolished.
The total number of independent MPs in parliament is now 14.
Duffield’s letter said she intended to sit as an independent MP “guided by my core Labour values”.
The Sunday Times said she was the fastest MP to jump ship after a general election in modern political history.
The winter fuel payment, was previously paid to all pensioners to help with energy bills. It was based on the principle that older people would be left exposed and at increased risk if they could not pay for adequate heating.
But in July, the government said the payment would now be made only to those on low incomes who received certain benefits.
The prime minister has faced growing criticism after it initially emerged he had received more than £16,000 for work clothing and spectacles for him, and further donations for his wife, from Labour peer Waheed Alli.
The PM has also defended accepting £20,000 worth of accommodation from Lord Alli during the election campaign so his son could revise for his GCSEs without the media outside his home.
