Mary Creagh joins Labour race with pledge to win back middle England

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/may/14/mary-creagh-declares-candidacy-for-labour-leadership

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Mary Creagh, the shadow international development secretary who backed David Miliband in 2010, is contesting the Labour leadership with a pledge to “earn back the trust” of middle England. Creagh, the MP for Wakefield since 2005, who served as a junior whip in the final year of Gordon Brown’s government, said Labour had suffered a “thumping defeat” after failing to understand people’s aspirations.

In a rare move for a candidate seeking to win the Labour leadership, Creagh announced her plans in an article for MailOnline. Creagh, a moderniser who was demoted by Ed Miliband last year from the more senior position of shadow transport secretary, issued a cry for Labour to return to the era of Tony Blair when it won three elections in a row. She wrote: “I want to earn back the trust that middle England has lost in the Labour party. We forgot the hard-learned lessons of our last three election victories; that to win elections a party needs to offer hope.

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“Labour didn’t just lose middle England last week. We lost Scotland and our industrial heartlands as well. I want to earn back the trust that Scotland has lost in the Labour party where people were angry and felt that Westminster politics wasn’t working for them.”

She warned that Labour lost the election because people did not trust the party on the economy. “People felt that Labour didn’t understand their aspiration to earn money and provide a better life for their family,” she wrote. “People trust Labour to look after their schools, hospitals and council services. But they simply do not trust us to run the economy and make them better off. That must change.”

Creagh won widespread sympathy when she was moved from her post as shadow transport secretary in a reshuffle prompted by the decision of Jim Murphy to become leader of the Scottish Labour party. She had been a strong supporter of the HS2 railway line, which was meant to be official government policy.