Chris Leslie, Luciana Berger, Ann Coffey, Chuka Umunna, Mike Gapes, Angela Smith and Gavin Shuker will sit as a new Independent Group of MPs while planning their next steps.
Seven Labour MPs: Chris Leslie, Luciana Berger, Ann Coffey, Chuka Umunna, Mike Gapes, Angela Smith and Gavin Shuker have left the Labour Party. They will sit as a new Independent Group of MPs while planning their next steps, just as the Gang of Four – the four Labour ministers who broke away to form the SDP in 1981 – left in January but didn’t ultimately form a political party until March.
For all seven, the decision to leave was essentially made long ago. One of their number described themselves as “emotionally disconnected” from the Labour Party as far back as the summer of 2018, another has long been freely saying that “the Labour Party no longer exists”, and all have before now made statements on the record that were impossible to reconcile with continuing membership of the Labour party. Luciana Berger, who spoke first at County Hall, from where I write today’s email, spoke of becoming “embarrassed” by the state of the Labour Party, whose values of equality have been “undermined and attacked”. She spoke of “leaving a culture of bullying, bigotry and intimidation”.
For many involved with the breakaway, relief, tinged with sadness, is the overwhelming emotion at leaving.
