Monica Lennon, a former Scottish Labour MSP seen as a potential successor to Anas Sarwar, has said she will not rule out standing for the party leadership. Ms Lennon lost her seat at the Holyrood election in May but will return to Parliament when Mr Sarwar leaves.
Return to Holyrood
Mr Sarwar is expected to leave the Scottish Parliament to join the House of Lords as a minister in Andy Burnham’s government. Because Ms Lennon is next on the Glasgow region list, she would be offered a seat as an MSP if he steps down.
Speaking to the Daily Record’s Planet Holyrood podcast, she confirmed she would take up the seat. “It would be a huge honour and privilege to go back to Parliament and serve as a member for Glasgow,” she said. “If I had the opportunity to go back to Parliament, I would absolutely welcome that.”
Leadership ambitions
Ms Lennon ran for the leadership in 2021 but lost to Mr Sarwar. On a potential leadership contest, she added: “I am not going to rule myself out of anything right now. I want to respect other colleagues and hear what they have to say.”
She told the newspaper she had “unfinished business” at Holyrood. Labour MSPs Michael Marra and Paul Sweeney are seen as other potential leadership rivals.
Criticism of Starmer
Ms Lennon said Mr Sarwar deserved “huge credit” as leader but blamed former prime minister Sir Keir Starmer as the “main barrier” to success for her party in May. “As we have seen, when things were going well for Keir Starmer at the election, there was a benefit for Scottish Labour. When things are going badly, it all turns to disaster literally overnight. How do you protect any organisation, in this case a political party, when different parts of the organisation are not doing so well?”
She added: “The next phase for Scottish Labour needs to be getting back to reasserting who Scottish Labour is for, why we even exist and who it is we are trying to help.” She said Labour’s Holyrood manifesto should have had a “bolder articulation of who we stand up for”.
Mr Sarwar is expected to be appointed to the House of Lords and become a minister in the expanded Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade.
