Frank Field MP to stand for his own Birkenhead Social Justice Party in next general election

Veteran MP Frank Field has said he will stand at the next general election as an effective independent.

The 77-year-old parliamentarian, who has served since 1979, shared the news in his constituency Birkenhead shortly after noon on Friday.

His team wrote on Twitter: “I will be standing at the next general election as the Birkenhead Social Justice candidate.”

A link then leads to a page for the party.

The chairman of the Work and Pensions Select Committee had been sitting as an independent after quitting the Labour party in August last year.

He had lost a vote of no confidence by his local Labour party the previous month, after voting with the Government on Brexit.

The resignation sparked speculation that he could join another party, such as the Lib Dems or Change UK.

However, in contrast with their anti-Brexit stance, Mr Field campaigned in 2016 to leave the EU.

Mr Field, who has been MP for Birkenhead for 40 years, said in his Labour resignation letter in 2018 that his party of 40 years was now governed by “a culture of intolerance, nastiness and intimidation”.

He said he was resigning after “the latest example of Labour’s leadership becoming a force for antisemitism in British politics”.

“The leadership is doing nothing substantive to address this erosion of our core values,” he added.