Jess Phillips says Labour rebels should not be surprised by the action taken against them

The Guardian

17-07-2025

Update:
Date: 2025-07-17T08:12:45.000Z
Title: Eleni Courea
Content: Good morning. Chief whips tends to be quite secretive, and when four Labour MPs had the whip suspended yesterday, there was no detailed, public explanation as to why they were being punished for rebelling when so many other backbenchers, who have also voted against the party, have not been singled out. As and Jessica Elgot report in our overnight story, we were just told they were regular rebels.
But the best explanation came from the Labour party source who told Geri Scott from the Times that the four MPs – Rachael Maskell, Neil Duncan-Jordan, Brian Leishman and Chris Hinchliff – were being punished for 'persistent knobheadery'.
This is problematic because, if 'persistent knobheadery' is a crime, then some of the greatest parliamentarians of all time were also guilty of it. Winston Churchill is regarded as the greatest war leader of all time, but he twice switched parties and, in the 1930, when he was leading a lonely fight against his party and over self-government for India and appeasement, 'knobhead' would have been one of the politer things colleagues would have said about him. The same is true of Aneurin Bevan during the second world war, and again in the 1950s. And Enoch Powell, and Tony Benn, and Jeremy Corbyn – and many others.
The four MPs disciplined yesterday are not necessarily in the same category as most of these figures, but some Labour MPs are unhappy at the precedent that has been set.
Jess Phillips, the minister for safeguarding, has been doing interviews this morning. She was meant to be talking about measures announced today that the Home Office says will mean 'more women and children will be better protected from domestic abuse through the direct targeting of perpetrators', but inevitably she ended up defending the decision taken yesterday.
All four MPs suspended voted against the government's welfare bill, even after the government announced two sets of major concessions, and one of them, Rachael Maskell, ended up leading the opposition on the day of the final vote. But Phillips claimed the four were not being punished for their opposition to the cuts in sickness and disability benefits. She told the Today programme:
I don't think that the discipline that has been meted out over the last 24 hours is linked to [the welfare bill] because many more people voted against the government than these four people.
But when asked why they were being disciplined, Phillips claimed not to know the full story. Asked what the reasons were for the MPs being suspended, she replied:
I actually don't know because I'm not part of the disciplining team.
But 'a level of persistence' was probably a factor, she said.
And she said discipline was important.
The reality is there has to be an element of discipline, otherwise, you end up not being able to govern.
Here is the agenda for the day.
10.30am: Keir Starmer is due to launch a Civil Society Covenant at an event in London.
11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.
Lunchtime: Starmer welcomes Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, to Downing Street.
Afternoon: Starmer and Merz visit a factory in Hertfordshire, where they will speak to the media.
Around 4pm: Wes Streeting, health secretary, holds a meeting with the BMA's resident doctors committee.
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