Jess Phillips is viewed as an outside bet when it comes to the Labour leadership race. While she has a good chance of making it through the parliamentary round, Phillips will have her work cut out among the membership. The Labour MP for Birmingham Yardley has been openly critical of Jeremy Corbyn and also once told key Corbyn ally Diane Abbott to ‘f— off’ (see Steerpike for full details of the incident). Another issue is that in comparison to some of the candidates (as Isabel noted on Coffee House) less is known of Phillips’s political beliefs in terms of policy.
I sat down with Phillips last year to record an episode of the Spectator’s Women With Balls podcast. Below were the key takeaways – and the full episode can be listened to here:
Phillips grew up in a political family where it was expected that you would support Labour:
‘It’s a bit like being religious I suppose.
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