By Genevieve Holl-Allen, Telegraph
Labour MP says party has been pushed into a place ‘that doesn’t come naturally to us’ and blames Morgan McSweeney
Sir Keir Starmer has “ended up in the wrong place” on trans issues, Dame Emily Thornberry has said.
The senior Labour MP, who was Sir Keir’s shadow attorney general before the general election, claimed the party had not been “following our hearts” when it came to trans people.
The Prime Minister’s public position on trans issues has significantly changed since he became leader of the Labour Party in 2020, backtracking last year on his previous stance that “trans women are women”.
Dame Emily blamed Morgan McSweeney, the Prime Minister’s former chief of staff who left Downing Street last month, for “trying to push” the Labour Party into political positions that did not come “naturally” to MPs.
She told the BBC’s Political Thinking podcast: “I think we’ve ended up in the wrong place on trans and I think we’ve ended up treading very self-consciously and not ending up following our hearts.”
She added: “Trans people are on the margins, they are vulnerable. If the Labour Party doesn’t look after trans people, what are we about?”