Three names now in the hat in Labour candidates Blackpool South battle

Simon Cartmell launched his campaign to be chosen as the candidate following Chris Webb’s announcement last month of his bid to be chosen as Labour’s Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for the constituency.

Sarah Smith, programmes director for education charity Right To Succeed, has also declared her intention to stand and is expected for formally launch a campaign.

Mr Cartmell, whose launch event was held at The Wainwright Club on Hornby Road, worked for the NHS for 17 years and is now a constituency support member for a Labour MP.

He said: “I’m standing for selection in Blackpool South because I can’t sit by any longer and watch the Conservatives destroy the NHS I worked so proudly for.

“I can’t sit by and watch friends and neighbours struggle to put food on their table, heat their homes or just pay their rent or mortgage.”

Simon was born and brought up in Blackpool and has lived in South Shore since 1996 where he has been chairman of Blackpool South Labour since 2019.

He has been secretary of the Blackpool Centre For the Unemployed since 2017, a charity founded by Labour councillors in 1982 which provides welfare rights advice and support.

He added: “It’s time for real change, and that can only come with a Labour government in Westminster.

“I want to be Blackpool South’s voice in that government, because we need a local representative that has lived, worked and paid their way here and understands our town.

“It’s time we had an MP who isn’t interested in running people down but in coming up with the solutions Blackpool needs, now and in the future. I am the candidate for that.”

Mr Webb, a former deputy police and crime commissioner, has said he wants to ‘provide grass root solutions and deliver real change for [his] home town,’ which he believes has suffered from the ‘sticking plaster, short-term mindset of funding and support’.

Former Labour MP Gordon Marsden held the Blackpool South seat for 22 years until Scott Benton won it for the Conservatives with a majority of 3,690 votes at the 2019 General Election.