Articles - Bridget Phillipson

Labour loves nostalgia. But we succeed when our politics is about the future

We love nostalgia in the Labour Party. We pepper our politics with references to people in office seventy years ago. Sometimes we seem to drench our party political broadcasts in a sense of how things were better in the past, an implicit promise that our future will be a recapturing…

Bridget Phillipson MP: Revive our communities and unlock region’s potential

I’m always amazed to see first-hand the invaluable efforts of those in our area who work week-in, week-out to make our community the best possible place to live. Whether they are selfless volunteers or carers going above and beyond for vulnerable people, they are motivated by a desire to help.…

Bridget Phillipson MP: Invoking the spectre of rioting is an insult to those who voted Leave

Using the threat of other people’s criminal violence to demand you get your way is despicable from anyone. It is the politics of the protection racket. It’s not, sadly, altogether unusual these days, but what’s new in recent weeks is threefold. First, these threats are coming directly from government. Not…

Bridget Phillipson MP: The Tories have got their priorities all wrong

Even in these turbulent times, few expected such a calamitous start to Boris Johnson’s tenure as Prime Minister. In a mess of his own making, he has suffered an unprecedented six defeats in Parliament in just six days. But it is essential in our democracy that MPs are able to…

Bridget Phillipson MP: The fate of Nissan is a sure sign of how Brexit will hit the north – we need a Final Say

I was only two when Margaret Thatcher came to the constituency where I was born and brought up. It was 1986 and she was opening the Nissan factory because, as she said, “within the whole of Europe, the United Kingdom was the most attractive country – politically and economically – for large-scale…

Bridget Phillipson MP: Voters must have the final say on Brexit

Labour’s position on a confirmatory referendum seems to shift daily, but even if every Labour MP backed one, we’d still need either government support, or Tory MPs breaking the whip. And there are still Labour MPs holding sincere reservations about the prospect, including colleagues I respect tremendously like Gloria De…

Bridget Phillipson MP: Thursday’s results mean there’s only one way forward: ask the people

Local elections are inevitably – and rightly – about local issues but there’s no getting away from the reality that Brexit played a big part in the shocking results that began rolling in on Thursday night. Those votes make clear that a general election would not deliver a decisive victory to either…

Labour’s 2017 manifesto was far from perfect – we can’t be bound by it forever

Last week saw a number of my colleagues decide they could no longer remain Labour MPs. I won’t be leaving Labour, but I have no hesitation in saying that some of the reasons given by those who left shame all of us who stay. I still believe that the Labour…

My constituency voted to leave – but I’m still backing another referendum

There’s a lot that the Labour chair Ian Lavery says about the UK with which I agree from the bottom of my heart. That’s hardly surprising – we’re both Labour MPs from north-east England, both grew up in the communities we represent, and both serve as MPs for places which have suffered not…

If we want to win the next referendum, we’ll need a better campaign than the last one

For those, like me, who believe that the time has come for a referendum on either leaving the EU on the terms of Theresa May’s deal, or staying in the EU after all, we have a difficult question to answer: what goes on the side of our bus? The 2016…