Two weeks after winning re-election as Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn has begun a reshuffle of his shadow cabinet, rewarding allies and sacking his chief whip. Mr Corbyn promoted fellow London MP Diane Abbott to shadow home secretary and appointed Baroness Shami Chakrabarti, former director of civil liberties group Liberty, as shadow attorney general.
He sacked Rosie Winterton, who had served as Labour's chief whip under three leaders, replacing her with Nick Brown, who held the post under Gordon Brown. Dame Rosie played an important role negotiating between Mr Corbyn and his mostly hostile parliamentary party after he became leader last year.
“I’d like to pay tribute to Rosie Winterton for her six years’ exceptional service as chief whip. She has played an outstanding role both in her support for me as leader and the Labour Party as a whole,” the Labour leader said.
Ms Abbott’s promotion means that, with Emily Thornberry as shadow foreign secretary, two of the four great offices of state are now shadowed by women. Mr Corbyn faced criticism last year for failing to appoint enough women to senior posts in his first shadow cabinet.
Keir Starmer has been appointed as the party’s spokesman on Brexit and Jonathan Reynolds, who was viewed as unfriendly by the leadership, is shadow economic secretary, in charge of policy on the City of London.
The reshuffle has been widely expected, as Labour has been unable to field a full front bench since a mass walk-out from the shadow cabinet following the EU referendum in June. Shadow ministers co-ordinated their resignations in the hope of pressuring Mr Corbyn to step down as leader. Instead, he fought a second leadership election, winning a bigger majority among party members than in 2015.
Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron said the first appointments in Mr Corbyn’s reshuffle showed that the Labour leader was unwilling to reach out to centrists in his party.
“Jeremy Corybn and his old comrade Diane Abbott, the new shadow home secretary, are obsessed with re-fighting the battles of the past and ignoring the damage the government is doing to our future. It must be clear now to moderate, centrist Labour supporters that they have lost control of their party. Only the Liberal Democrats are fighting to keep Britain in Europe and providing the real opposition to the Conservative Brexit government,” Mr Farron said.
