London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Thursday, Sep 18, 2025

‘They’re all lawyers’: Labour voters look elsewhere in Batley byelection

‘They’re all lawyers’: Labour voters look elsewhere in Batley byelection

Some blame local problems on Labour-led council and say party does not represent working class

“My brother was a miner, my dad was a builder, my mam was a barmaid who worked in mills, I was a nurse – you’re not going to vote anybody but Labour, are you?”

Cheryl Rowan, 62, is just the type of voter that the Labour party is desperately trying to hold on to in next week’s byelection in Batley and Spen, and in their former northern heartlands more generally. She lives in one of a small row of council houses in Heckmondwike, a town formerly known for manufacturing blankets as part of West Yorkshire’s heavy woollen district. That industry is long gone.

“There’s no shoe factories, no textiles, we were a northern powerhouse but now we ain’t got anything but restaurants and a new swimming pool that’s getting built that you can work at, and care … there’s no other jobs,” Rowan says.

Across Batley and Spen, almost one in three adults are economically inactive, compared with Britain’s average of just over one in five. However, home ownership is high in Heckmondwike: 71% of residents own their houses, and 60% of the homes are detached or semi-detached.

Known as Hecky, the town is a politically significant battleground in this byelection: Labour managed to hold on to the ward in May’s local elections, but the Conservative party doubled its votes.

Kim Leadbeater, the Labour candidate, and her older sister Jo Cox grew up in Heckmondwike and are well known here. James Pickles, 34, and Samantha Dakin, 30, remember Cox visiting the primary school that their two children attend, and are pleased to support Leadbeater. They both lost their jobs at the beginning of the pandemic and say they can understand why some locals “like to fight against power” by voting for other candidates, but they intend to remain loyal to Labour.

James Pickles and Samantha Dakin.


Rowan, however, has had enough. Despite her lifelong affiliation to the party, she has gradually grown detached from it over the years, and for the first time in her life she will vote Conservative.

The reasons are myriad and stretch back years. As a Brexit supporter, she describes with disgust an image during the referendum campaign of remain politicians and Bob Geldof “on a yacht, shouting down at fishermen while drinking champagne”. She says Jeremy Corbyn “put me off totally”, and she does not think the party represents working-class people. “They’re all lawyers or doctors,” she says. “Keir Starmer – he was a lawyer, wasn’t it? He’s not Harold Wilson, is he?”

Leadbeater began her campaign with a strong focus on local issues that are continually raised by residents: poorly kept roads, rising crime rates, litter. However, many residents lay the blame for those issues at the feet of the local Labour-led council and previous Labour MPs.

Rowan acknowledges that the council has had to make cuts as a result of government-imposed austerity, but says: “It’s Labour who have been in power here, so you blame your local council, don’t you? They’ve got the money.”


George Galloway’s entry into the race means the Labour campaign has also turned to foreign policy issues important to Muslim voters, who make up about one-fifth of the community. Rowan says she has good relationships with her Muslim neighbours, who check in on her and deliver food during religious festivals, but she dislikes this focus. “[The election is] about Heckmondwike … it’s not about Palestine and Israel. Why bring that into it?”

Other white voters cite this as a reason for not supporting Labour, such as Lisa James, 50, who worked in sales management pre-pandemic and is now a home carer. “I don’t believe that the Labour candidate’s got the interests of Batley and Spen [at heart], I think she’s more about foreign policy,” James says. She will also vote Conservative next week. “My dad would probably turn in his grave that I’ve voted Tory, but there you go.”

Another issue that the main parties have been keen to avoid becoming a focus is the controversy that erupted when a teacher at Batley grammar school was suspended after showing an image of the prophet Muhammad to a class, prompting protests outside the school gates. An investigation cleared the teacher of causing deliberate offence and lifted the suspension while apologising for distress caused and recommending further training for teaching staff.

However, according to Paul Halloran, an independent who stood for election in the constituency in 2019, it is the “most important issue in this election”. Halloran made the claim at a rally alongside the self-described free speech activist Lawrence Fox on Thursday night. A few hundred people gathered in Batley marketplace, between the now closed Batley police station and the Jo Cox House children’s centre, despite a warning from Kirklees council that it should not go ahead owing to concerns over public safety and potential disruption.

Candidates’ signs in Heckmondwike.


The evening passed peacefully, with occasional jeers and boos on mentions of the council and the Labour and Tory candidates’ failure to attend, although a statement was read out on behalf of Leadbeater in support of vigorous and healthy debate that remains respectful.

Watched by a handful of officers, Halloran said his aim was to “stand with the teacher”, who he claimed had been forced to flee his home with his family and feared returning to the school. The school did not respond to a request for comment for this article.

Galloway, who has previously told the Guardian that people have a “right to defend religious sensibilities and be offended by gratuitous, egregious insults”, said at the rally that the full report of the investigation into the matter should be published so that people can “work out whether or not they reached the right conclusion”.

Praising Halloran – whose 12% of the 2019 vote share he hopes to attract – as “almost miraculous”, Galloway also said he talked with Fox “all the time” because he “abhors this cancel culture” that labels people “one step to the right of you far-right and one step to the right a fascist”. In a diatribe against “liberal identity politics”, he raised claps and cheers from the crowd when he said he did not want his children to be “taught how to masturbate in school” and that there were “99 genders”.

George Galloway addressing the ‘free speech’ rally in Batley on Thursday.


He continued this theme at a hustings later on Thursday evening for British Muslim TV, describing Labour’s support for trans rights including self-identification as “a grotesque policy”. Leadbeater described his comments as “hugely disrespectful to trans people”.

“I’m very sorry but we can’t pick our equalities,” she told Galloway at the hustings. “I will stand side by side with my Muslim brothers and sisters, side by side by my gay friends, and my trans friends as well.”

The Tory candidate, Ryan Stephenson, did not attend the event, and in a final address to the audience Leadbeater said: “On July 2 you will wake up with a new MP for Batley and Spen. And the reality is it will either be me or the person who couldn’t even do you the courtesy of turning up tonight.”

Echoing her older sister’s famous maiden House of Commons speech, Leadbeater said: “When the circus leaves town and the cameras are all gone, we have to live here together peacefully,” and she urged constituents to elect an MP who could “bring people together, not sow division and drive them apart”.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Macron and his wife to provide 'scientific photographic evidence' that she is a real woman
US Tech Giants Pledge Billions to UK AI Infrastructure Following Starmer's Call
Saudi Arabia cracks down on music ‘lounges’ after conservative backlash
DeepMind and OpenAI Achieve Gold at ‘Coding Olympics’ in AI Milestone
SEC Allows Public Companies to Block Investors from Class-Action Lawsuits
Saudi Arabia Signs ‘Strategic Mutual Defence’ Pact with Pakistan, Marking First Arab State to Gain Indirect Access to Nuclear Strike Capabilities in the Region
Federal Reserve Cuts Rates by Quarter Point and Signals More to Come
Effective and Impressive Generation Z Protest: Images from the Riots in Nepal
European manufacturers against ban on polluting cars: "The industry may collapse"
Sam Altman sells the 'Wedding Estate' in Hawaii for 49 million dollars
Trump: Cancel quarterly company reports and settle for reporting once every six months
Turkish car manufacturer Togg Enters German Market with 5-Star Electric Sedan and SUV to Challenge European EV Brands
US Launches New Pilot Program to Accelerate eVTOL Air Taxi Deployment
Christian Brueckner Released from German Prison after Serving Unrelated Sentence
World’s Longest Direct Flight China Eastern to Launch 29-Hour Shanghai–Buenos Aires Direct Flight via Auckland in December
New OpenAI Study Finds Majority of ChatGPT Use Is Personal, Not Professional
Hong Kong Industry Group Calls for HK$20 Billion Support Fund to Ease Property Market Stress
Joe Biden’s Post-Presidency Speaking Fees Face Weak Demand amid Corporate Reluctance
Charlie Kirk's murder will break the left's hateful cancel tactics
Kash Patel erupts at ‘buffoon’ Sen. Adam Schiff over Russiagate: ‘You are the biggest fraud’
Homeland Security says Emmy speech ‘fanning the flames of hatred’ after Einbinder’s ‘F— ICE’ remark
Charlie Kirk’s Alleged Assassin Tyler Robinson Faces Death Penalty as Charges Formally Announced
Actor, director, environmentalist Robert Redford dies at 89
The conservative right spreads westward: a huge achievement for 'Alternative for Germany' in local elections
JD Vance Says There Is “No Unity” with Those Who Celebrate Charlie Kirk’s Killing, and he is right!
Trump sues the 'New York Times' for an astronomical sum of 15 billion dollars
Florida Hospital Welcomes Its Largest-Ever Baby: Annan, Nearly Fourteen Pounds at Birth
U.S. and Britain Poised to Finalize Over $10 Billion in High-Tech, Nuclear and Defense Deals During Trump State Visit
China Finds Nvidia Violated Antitrust Laws in Mellanox Deal, Deepens Trade Tensions with US
US Air Force Begins Modifications on Qatar-Donated Jet Amid Plans to Use It as Air Force One
Pope Leo Warns of Societal Crisis Over Mega-CEO Pay, Citing Tesla’s Proposed Trillion-Dollar Package
Poland Green-Lights NATO Deployment in Response to Major Russian Drone Incursion
Elon Musk Retakes Lead as World’s Richest After Brief Ellison Surge
U.S. and China Agree on Framework to Shift TikTok to American Ownership
London Daily Podcast: London Massive Pro Democracy Rally, Musk Support, UK Economic Data and Premier League Results Mark Eventful Weekend
This Week in AI: Meta’s Superintelligence Push, xAI’s Ten Billion-Dollar Raise, Genesis AI’s Robotics Ambitions, Microsoft Restructuring, Amazon’s Million-Robot Milestone, and Google’s AlphaGenome Update
Le Pen Tightens the Pressure on Macron as France Edges Toward Political Breakdown
Musk calls for new UK government at huge pro-democracy rally in London, but Britons have been brainwashed to obey instead of fighting for their human rights
Elon Musk responds to post calling for the murder of Erika Kirk, widow of Charlie Kirk: 'Either we fight back or they will kill us'
Czech Republic signs €1.34 billion contract for Leopard 2A8 main battle tanks with delivery from 2028
USA: Office Depot Employees Refused to Print Poster in Memory of Charlie Kirk – and Were Fired
Proposed U.S. Bill Would Allow Civil Suits Against Judges Who Release Repeat Violent Offenders
Penske Media Sues Google Over “AI Overviews,” Claiming It Uses Journalism Without Consent and Destroys Traffic
Indian Student Engineers Propose “Project REBIRTH” to Protect Aircraft from Crashes Using AI, Airbags and Smart Materials
French Debt Downgrade Piles Pressure on Macron’s New Prime Minister
US and UK Near Tech, Nuclear and Whisky Deals Ahead of Trump Trip
One in Three Europeans Now Uses TikTok, According to the Chinese Tech Giant
Could AI Nursing Robots Help Healthcare Staffing Shortages?
NATO Deploys ‘Eastern Sentry’ After Russian Drones Violate Polish Airspace
Anesthesiologist Left Operation Mid-Surgery to Have Sex with Nurse
×