{"id":603217,"date":"2026-05-25T16:03:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T16:03:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/603217\/"},"modified":"2026-05-25T16:03:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T16:03:10","slug":"labour-has-never-had-a-female-leader-because-its-a-bit-sexist-says-jess-phillips-jess-phillips","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/603217\/","title":{"rendered":"Labour has never had a female leader because \u2018it\u2019s a bit sexist\u2019, says Jess Phillips | Jess Phillips"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Labour MP Jess Phillips<\/a> has described her party as \u201csexist\u201d for having no permanent female leaders in its history.<\/p>\n

Asked at the Hay literary festival why Labour<\/a> has never had a female leader, Phillips responded that \u201clike all institutions, it\u2019s a bit sexist innit\u201d. She added that \u201cevery institution that every single person in this room works for is led by the patriarchy\u201d.<\/p>\n

Phillips, MP for Birmingham Yardley, resigned<\/a> as minister for safeguarding and violence against women and girls on 12 May \u2013 one of four ministers to step down that day citing loss of confidence in the prime minister, Keir Starmer. Wes Streeting, the health secretary, followed on 14 May.<\/p>\n

While the Conservatives have had three female prime ministers, Labour has never had a permanent female leader, with Margaret Beckett and Harriet Harman having served as acting leaders only.<\/p>\n

That record looks unlikely to change if a Labour leadership contest does take place this summer \u2013 with Andy Burnham as the likely frontrunner if he wins the Makerfield byelection on 18 June and Streeting his competition<\/a> from the right of the party.<\/p>\n

While Angela Rayner being cleared by HMRC<\/a> over her tax affairs earlier this month paved the way for a leadership bid, she has not declared an intention to run, and has said she will campaign for Burnham in next month\u2019s byelection. Both Rayner and Burnham belong to the so-called \u201csoft left\u201d of the party.<\/p>\n

Phillips said she hoped for \u201cwild cards\u201d in a leadership contest, but refused to specify who they might be. \u201cIt\u2019s whether Keir Starmer would stand in the contest, I suppose, is the wild card bit of it.\u201d If Starmer does not step down, he would automatically appear on the ballot.<\/p>\n

Phillips appeared at a panel event alongside the Green party\u2019s Ellie Chowns and the Times journalist Patrick Maguire.<\/p>\n

She called the position Labour had got itself into as \u201ckind of bants\u201d, later describing it as \u201cterrible\u201d and \u201cheart-wrenching\u201d.<\/p>\n

Phillips said she was going to Makerfield to campaign for Burnham. Asked about the fact that Starmer would be campaigning for the man who was likely to replace him, she said \u201call that should matter to anyone in politics is that you care about the country and the right outcome\u201d.<\/p>\n

On the lack of female Labour leaders, Phillips added: \u201cI have to say, the idea that a woman leads and it makes it better for women is not one that I\u2019ve recognised in this country. My mortgage went up by a thousand pounds a month, cheers Liz [Truss]. I shouted at her, every time I saw her, the amount that she now owed me. She has not paid me back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Phillips also said that the fact Starmer was seen as a \u201cgood guy\u201d had become \u201cthrowaway\u201d but \u201cshouldn\u2019t be\u201d, because \u201cwe didn\u2019t have that for a long time. We didn\u2019t have decency.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said the \u201canti-politics\u201d of the Greens and Reform UK \u201csounds the same to me\u201d, adding that while she might agree with the Greens more ideologically, she thought it was \u201cvery, very easy to just slag off the system and the people who are part of it without actually committing to the real solutions\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Labour MP Jess Phillips has described her party as \u201csexist\u201d for having no permanent female leaders in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":603218,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-603217","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/603217","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=603217"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/603217\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/603218"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=603217"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=603217"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=603217"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}