KEIR Starmer will today call for the radical redistribution of power, wealth and opportunity within a “new constitutional settlement” as he returns to the Labour leadership campaign trail.
The Shadow Brexit Secretary, who will travel to Scotland this week, was forced to cancel events when his mother-in-law was admitted to hospital following an accident.
He will kick-off a week of campaigning across the UK with a speech in east London this evening arguing for a federal system in which power and resources are devolved.
Sir Keir, a frontrunner in the race to replace Jeremy Corbyn, will call for the end of the status quo and say power, wealth and opportunity should be put back into the hands of the people.
He said: "The status quo is not working. People are crying out for more control, power and say over their own lives and local communities. This can't be delivered by tinkering around the edges or with short-term fixes.
"We need to end the monopoly of power in Westminster and spread it across every town, city, region and nation of the United Kingdom. We have to end the status quo and put power, wealth and opportunity back into the hands of the people."
Calling for a "new constitutional settlement" with large-scale devolution of power and resources under a federal system, he added: "We will only repair the shattered trust in politics by letting people take back control of the decisions that affect their lives."
In other developments -
*Emily Thornberry, another leadership contender who will also be in Scotland this week, suggested if she won, Labour would be "led by the Scottish party" on whether it backed or opposed indyref2. She accepted a "lot has changed" since 2014 and "maybe we have to look at having a discussion again" on indyref2. "We should be listening to Scottish members, we should be listening to the Scottish Labour Party," declared the Shadow Foreign Secretary.
*Ian Murray, Labour’s only Scottish MP vying for the deputy leadership, said he would bring a “Scottish voice” to the party’s leadership. He insisted he was the change candidate and warned the party if it failed to recognise it faced a “huge challenge,” then “we will never win again”.
*Len McCluskey, the Unite General Secretary, claimed opponents of Mr Corbyn had despicably "used the anti-Semitism issue" that has engulfed Labour to undermine his leadership.
*John McDonnell, the Shadow Chancellor, speaking ahead of a seminar on where Labour goes following the election defeat, said the Left had failed to develop a successful strategy to transform society, noting if the party wanted to transform society, it needed leaders and a movement which understood the economy and society in which it operated.
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