Uh oh. Not everyone in Sir Keir’s Labour party is in celebration mode right now. The Prime Minister has finished dishing out government roles and one MP in particular has voiced her unhappiness about not receiving a position. Passed over for a government post, Emily Thornberry has taken to Twitter to opine on her snub from Starmer. The new PM has instead opted to make Richard Hermer KC – a lawyer who represented Gerry Adams – his attorney general over Thornberry, despite her comfortable win in Islington South last week and her years of experience in the shadow cabinet.
In a less than humble statement, the Labour MP and former shadow attorney general wrote:
After eight-and-a-half unbroken years in the shadow cabinet, a longer record of service than anyone else in that time, I have always worked my hardest to keep the Labour party united, support our candidates across the country, take the fight to the Tories and put a positive case to the British people about what we would do differently.
Continuing on, the re-elected MP fumed:
I am very sorry and surprised not to be able to continue that work in government, but I wish all my brilliant colleagues well, and I know that Richard Hermer KC – a much more accomplished lawyer than I could ever hope to be – will do an outstanding job as Attorney General.
Noting her ‘personal disappointment’, Thornberry turned to praise the ‘amazing and historic victory’ achieved by her party, adding that she will ‘continue [to give] my unstinting loyalty to our Prime Minister’. After making a rather public dig, of course.
‘Keir has been director of public prosecutions and has a high opinion of his legal ability at the top level,’ a senior lawyer confided to the i newspaper about the appointment. ‘And if you ask me whether he would take Emily’s advice over another in a crisis, the answer I’m afraid, was always going to be “no”.’ Ouch. Talk about trouble in paradise…
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