Kingswood candidate warns Labour has “mountain to climb” to win by-election

Labour’s candidate in the upcoming Kingswood by-election has warned that the party has a “mountain to climb” to win the seat from the Tories and urged people to visit to help the party reach more voters ahead of polling day.

In an interview with LabourList, Damien Egan highlighted that the Tories had won the seat in the south west of England with a majority of more than 11,000 in 2019, but said canvassers were hearing from lots of people switching.

“That’s why we need help. We need to speak to people, talk through Labour’s plan for Kingswood and Labour’s plan for the country,” Egan said.

The by-election – triggered by the resignation of Conservative MP Chris Skidmore over his party’s stance on new oil and gas licences – will take place on February 15th, the same day as a by-election in Wellingborough.

Egan – who previously served as the mayor of Lewisham in south London – told LabourList that “a lot of people” in Kingswood are still undecided about how to vote, adding: “That’s why we’ve got to speak to as many people as possible, to make those contacts, talk about those local issues.”

He said it has been “reassuring” that the issues that voters are raising “are the ones that Keir and the Labour Party have been talking about”, including the NHS, dentistry, jobs and skills. He also said he had seen a lot of interest in Labour’s energy policy plans.

Egan – who grew up locally – was selected as Labour’s candidate for the new seat of Bristol North East, but was subsequently chosen as the party’s candidate for the by-election following Skidmore’s resignation.

Just over a third of the Kingswood seat will be absorbed into Bristol North East come the general election, providing the logic for Egan’s selection in the awkwardly timed by-election – not long before boundaries are redrawn and voters head to the polls once more.

Egan said the reaction on the doorstep has been “very positive” despite having had to “hit the ground running quicker than expected”, adding that lots of people had already been out campaigning, from the local area and beyond.

He said campaigning has also been “fun” because he is knocking on the doors of people he went to school with, saying: “It’s exciting to be campaigning on the streets that you grew up in.”

But Egan has faced accusations of changing his accent from his time serving as a mayor in London to sound more local to the constituency he is now seeking to represent.

Asked whether similar themes were emerging in the Tories’ by-election campaign, he argued that the Tories “need to try and go as negative as they can and try and build this distrust in all politicians”.

“The reality is we’ve had a Conservative government for 14 years. It was a Conservative council until May,” he told LabourList, adding: “I think when people step back and they look at, right what have the Tories done for Kingswood, I think people are making their own judgement.”

He said if elected his first priority as an MP would be “making sure that you’re representing your constituents and making sure that our voice in parliament is heard”.

“I want people in Westminster to really understand that you cannot get a dentist in Bristol… People need to understand that. People need to understand that people are working really hard, really long hours and they’re really struggling,” he said.

Asked what first brought him into politics, Egan reflected on the “challenges” his family faced during his childhood and his experience of growing up under a Conservative government. “I remember just feeling the injustice of it all. And that still drives me. I really think that, in our part of Bristol, people deserve better.”