When a loyal Labour voter asked Emma Reynolds about her newborn baby in one breath and confessed they would not vote for her in the next, the sitting MP knew she would lose.
Ms Reynolds won Wolverhampton North East with a 2,484 majority in 2010 and increased it to 5,495 five years later.
In 2017 her majority dipped to 4,587.
But in December last year, her Tory rival seized the seat with a 4,080 majority on a 12.2% swing – another brick in Labour’s “Red Wall” heartlands demolished.
Speaking to the Mirror, Ms Reynolds admitted she was “pretty pessimistic quite early on”.
She said: “I had a particularly bad campaign session one Friday afternoon in an area that’s usually strong for us.
“But in order to keep going you have to convince yourself you’re not on a hiding to nothing, you persuade yourself that actually it’s just one bad campaigning session.
“But looking back, that’s when I really realised we were probably going to lose.”
Ms Reynolds gave birth to her second child over the summer.
But she still hit the streets with her campaign team when the election was triggered.
(Image: PA)
They were knocking doors of voters who previously said they would back Labour.
But this time electors “were either very aggressively against us – slamming the door in our face and saying, ‘No way’ – or saying, ‘Oooh, how’s your second baby? I don’t think I can vote for you this time, I’m really sorry’.
“Some were in anger, some in sorrow.
“But a lot of people in that particular session were just turning away from us.”
Ms Reynolds’ old seat sits on the edge of Wolverhampton city centre and leads towards the outskirts.
Her now-defunct constituency office is at the heart of the patch in the suburb of Oxley.
A shopping centre lies either side of the busy A449 Stafford Road dual carriageway,
carrying cars the two miles into town past smart, semi-detached houses.
Businesses include two Chinese takeaways, three bookies, four off licences and four funeral directors in the space of 200 yards.
Many shopfronts are shuttered – and they now include Ms Reynolds’ office after her defeat on December 12.
As the campaign wore on, attempts to convince traditional backers to stick with the party failed
“We got a mixture of not liking and not trusting Jeremy Corbyn and thinking the Labour Party was therefore a joke, and the idea they would vote for us again was something they wouldn’t give the time of day – totally impossible to persuade,” she said.
“They didn’t trust him on the economy, they didn’t believe all the things we were promising could be done without paying more in tax.
“There was a general dislike of him, a distrust – not wanting him to be Prime Minister.
“We tried what we tried in 2017 – ‘Don’t worry he won’t be Prime Minister, we’re not doing very well in the polls, but you can afford to vote for me as your local MP’.
“But that wasn’t getting any traction this time.
“We used that in 2017 relatively effectively.
“But the problem was we did better than anybody thought we would in 2017 and they had another two-and-a-half years to look at Jeremy, and I’m afraid they didn’t like what they saw.”
People perceived him to be “weak, a terrorist-sympathiser and a traitor”, she said.
“Anybody who had worked in the Armed Forces said, ‘I could never vote for that man’,” admitted Ms Reynolds.
Issues around economic credibility hampered Labour’s campaign.
“We said we would throw money around left, right and centre, and people just didn’t buy it, they thought that was a recipe for disaster – either the country would go bankrupt or they would have to pay more money in taxes,” she said.
“People didn’t feel like he was going to do things for them. It was a deep distrust.”
She wanted the party to hammer home three priorities: the NHS, schools and police.
But Labour’s scatter-gun approach lacked focus – allowing the Tories to press their Brexit message.
“We underestimated the Brexit fatigue,” said Ms Reynolds, who represented a seat where two thirds of people voted Leave.
(Image: Roland Leon Daily Mirror)
“I am sick of Brexit as well – we’re all sick of it – but people did buy the ‘Get Brexit Done’ message and we were getting it back at us on the doorstep.
“They thought MPs from all parties were standing in the way of it.
“The combination of that and Jeremy was killer because you could perhaps persuade people about one of those things but … there was nothing you could do if both of those things were in their minds.”
On polling day, one Labour loyalist tearfully admitted she would not back the party this time.
Ms Reynolds recalled: “She said, ‘I have always voted Labour but I cannot bring myself to vote Labour’ – and she literally had a tear in her eye.
“She was visibly upset and that is the position we put people in.
“I think it is a huge betrayal of people we traditionally represent.”
Ms Reynolds was a staunch critic of the Corbyn regime, long warning of the implosion which unfolded just before Christmas.
“In a way I’m weirdly vindicated because this is what I said would happen,” she said.
“But I lost my seat as a result.
(Image: Roland Leon Daily Mirror)
“It’s hugely frustrating because there was nothing I could do about Jeremy being the leader.”
As leadership hopefuls prepare for Sunday’s Mirror hustings in nearby Dudley, she urged the party not to back a “continuity Corbyn” candidate.
“We need to elect a leader who turns the page on Corbyn and all that he represents – not just him but the whole experiment that has failed,” she said.
“If there is any ‘continuity Corbyn’ leader, that would be a disaster and could be the end of the party.”
Ms Reynolds wants the next leader to “show people they are listening on controversial issues” like immigration.
She added: “We’ve got a lot of work to do and the next leader firstly has to change the party.
“In order to be credible again we need a different kind of party, a different kind of leadership, different Shadow Cabinet.
“We need to front up to the people who thought Jeremy Corbyn was going to lead this socialist revolution and say, ‘No, it was never ever going to be successful, and that’s never going to win us elections’.
“Whoever it is has got to tell some hard truths to the party – and the party’s got to be able to listen.”
She warned: “I’m not sure this is a five-year project.
“I would very much hope it can be turned around in five years but it might not be possible.”
Shoppers in the Wolverhampton North East suburb of Oxley delivered a scathing verdict on Labour torday – particularly outgoing leader Jeremy Corbyn.
Charity shop worker Liz Thomas, 63, said: “I voted Conservative, always have done.
“Boris is a little bit daft but he’s lovely.
“I’m hoping I haven’t done the wrong thing.
(Image: Roland Leon Daily Mirror)
“I hated Jeremy Corbyn, he’s just horrible, he’s slimy – it’s a woman thing.
“I voted for Brexit but it wasn’t a big part of why I voted Conservative in December.”
John O’Connor, 72, a retired bricklayer, said: “Personally I thought the best party got in.
“I voted for their principles.
“Boris is OK, he’s down to earth.
(Image: Roland Leon Daily Mirror)
“Jeremy Corbyn made a few mistakes but he wasn’t the only person who spoke to members of the IRA, yet that went against him.”
Unemployed hairdresser Nathan Lawrence, 40, said: “I’ve never voted in any general election and now I won’t ever do so.
“I made the biggest mistake of my life – I voted for Brexit.
“They told me that my NHS was going to get £350million extra.
(Image: Roland Leon Daily Mirror)
“I feel cheated, I feel lied to. I have lived here all my life and now my backyard, where I grew up, has become a UKIP heartland.
“I’m disgusted.”
Retired builder James Dell, 60, voted Conservative because it was “the only sensible thing to do”.
The Brexiteer said: “There’s no point voting Labour, they stood no chance of getting in because of their views on Brexit, their incompetence on Brexit, their division on Brexit.
“I’ve always been a Tory voter but there was no real option this time anyway.
(Image: Roland Leon Daily Mirror)
“Jeremy Corbyn was just ridiculous as a leader, far too left.
“It shouldn’t be about personas but, as everybody says, he’s like Steptoe, he’s not presentable, his views are outdated.
“I think people want a more centrist Labour Party.”
His wife Evelyn Dell, 49, a retired businesswoman, also backed the Conservatives.
She said: “I couldn’t vote Jeremy Corbyn because of the whole anti-Semitism thing.
“I didn’t agree with how that was dealt with by the party.
(Image: Roland Leon Daily Mirror)
“Boris is great, I don’t get it when people mock him.
“He doesn’t take the job too seriously until it needs to be and then he does.
“When I listen to him, everything he says makes sense to me.
“Labour needs to be more centrist.”
Linda Wilding, 66, a retired bookies shop worker, voted Tory because she wanted a crackdown on immigration.
She said: “Immigration was on lots of people’s minds with Brexit and they are the best party to lead us out of the EU.
(Image: Roland Leon Daily Mirror)
“I like Boris Johnson, he talks a lot of sense.
“I don’t think Jeremy Corbyn has got a clue.
“They need somebody who is more in touch with the average person, somebody more in the middle as opposed to being totally left wing.”
Student Marnie Wilding, 20, planned to vote Labour but was too tired to visit her polling station after a long day in college.
She believed Labour would have done more to help “the homeless and people who go to foodbanks”.
(Image: Roland Leon Daily Mirror)
She said: “I liked what the Labour Party was offering more than the Tories, it made more sense.
“I’m definitely going to vote next time and I will vote Labour.”
* The Mirror is hosting the Labour leadership and deputy leadership hustings on Sunday. If you have a question you would like to put to the candidates please email community@mirror.co.uk.
