‘More austerity would devastate us’: Voters wary of Labour in England’s poorest seat

Down at Liverpool’s North Docks, Everton football club’s new £800m stadium appears tantalisingly close to completion, its aluminium roof – visible for miles around – glimmering in the summer sunshine.

It is a symbol of the city’s regeneration, but may mask deep-rooted economic problems which must be tackled by whichever party wins the election next week.

In the shadow of this monument to Liverpool’s cultural and sporting excellence live some of the poorest people in the country.

Liverpool Riverside – stretching for eight miles along the Mersey – is the most deprived of the 543 constituencies in England according to a briefing paper produced by the House of Commons Library which measured multiple indices such as income, employment and health outcomes.

It takes in both the luxury apartments and attractions of the city centre and neighbourhoods such as Toxteth and Vauxhall where communities have never recovered from the post-industrial decline accelerated by the premiership of Margaret Thatcher.

As a result, voting Labour here has historically been non-negotiable and the incumbent MP Kim Johnson holds a majority of more than 37,000 votes.

But when i visited this week there were signs of discontent that should worry the party.

Everton football club’s £800m stadium is nearing completion at Bramley Moore Dock (Photo: Tony McArdle/Everton FC via Getty)

While canvassing voters in Dingle, a working class neighbourhood in south Liverpool viewed as a traditional Labour heartland, i watched on as voters told Ms Johnson they do not trust Keir Starmer and several said they would be voting for Reform instead.

Ms Johnson is in a battle with Reform UK’s Gary Hincks for the seat, with several other candidates also standing.

But even the Labour candidate has shown little enthusiasm for her party’s leader. She is disappointed that Mr Starmer will not commit to scrapping the two-child limit on benefits which would lift an estimated 300,000 children out of poverty.

“Kids are going to school with empty bellies,” she said. “[Removing the limit] would be a starting point. We’ve heard the Government wasted £1.2bn on getting rid of PPE – that money could have been used to remove the two-child limit.

“From my point of view it’s a nasty policy of punishment that the Tories brought in.

“[Shadow education secretary] Bridget Phillipson talks about breakfast clubs, a lot of schools are already funding breakfast clubs out of their own budget because of the deprivation, they’re doing meals during the school holidays.

“The threshold [for free school meals] is set so low, less than £7,400 a year, that amount needs to be increased.”

Kim Johnson, the Labour candidate for Liverpool Riverside, wants the two-child limit on benefits scrapped (Photo: i)

Beyond Labour’s policies, Ms Johnson also raised concerns about the Labour leader’s wider judgement, criticising his decision to place an advert in The Sun newspaper, which remains deeply unpopular in Liverpool due its coverage of the Hillsborough disaster.

She was also critical of his choice to welcome former Conservative MP Natalie Elphicke into the party, contrasting it with the party’s handling of Labour veteran Diane Abbott.

“When he talks about change, he says the party’s changed – changed for who? and how?” she said, explaining that she feels black voters have been “taken for granted” by Labour for “many years”.

Vowing to stand up to Mr Starmer from the back benches, Ms Johnson said: “You have to be brave. From my point of view, agreeing with everything the leadership says is not going to be good for the party – we’ve always been a broad church so let’s accept it.”

Listening to local voices in Liverpool, it’s easy to understand why Ms Johnson might feel she needs to take a more radical stance than the party leadership.

At Rotunda, a charity based in Kirkdale just a short stroll from the new Everton stadium, food bank volunteers are handing out bags of shopping to a steady stream of visitors.

“We don’t ask for names, it’s not means tested, we’re like a family,” the charity’s chief executive Maxine Ennis said.

“Once they walk through the door, which is the hardest thing, once we’ve got them we can help them, we can build up their self-esteem.

“People will come and say ‘I’ve got no gas [because I can’t afford to top up the meter] can you help me?’ and we can.

“Nobody wants to be in that position. People want to be able to afford their rent, to feed their children and that’s not happening.”

Maxine Ennis, CEO of charity Rotunda, fears any more austerity would be ‘devastating’ (Photo: i)

Like many places in the North, Liverpool was hit disproportionately hard by austerity measures, with the city council losing £444m between 2010 and 2020 – around 64 per cent of its overall budget.

Ms Ennis quickly saw local government retreat from places such as Kirkdale and the charity has had to expand its provision.

Rotunda started out 40 years ago as a small educational provider and when Ms Ennis joined in 2009 it had only four staff and a turnover of £150,000 a year.

It now employs 30 members of staff, has a turnover of £1.5m a year and helps local people with everything from childcare to fuel vouchers to teaching courses, as well as simply providing a welcoming space to exist.

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“When people have nowhere else to turn because services have been slashed, we’ve had to step in,” Ms Ennis said.

“When the Tory government came in, these services just withdrew.

“I would say that people have felt disenfranchised, disengaged, disillusioned by the decisions being made about them.

“The changes to benefits and Universal Credit have been horrendous, they’ve felt powerless.”

Labour have refused to commit to more funding for local councils if elected next week and continue to insist there will be no tax rises, with experts concluding the party is planning a fresh round of cuts to public services to balance the books.

For Ms Ennis, that would be “devastating”.

“We need to see a change, I’m hoping that Labour and Keir will put their money where their mouth is,” she added.

“It’s time to turn the page… it can’t get any worse. There’s a lot of work to do, but I think we’re in a place of hope.

“Liverpool needs to be shown as somewhere with aspiration and pride, we’ve got bucketlods of that.

“People want to work they don’t want to walk into that shed and take a loaf of bread.”

Not far from Rotunda, Scott, a 35-year-old father of two, says the problem is that working simply doesn’t pay enough.

“My gas and electric has gone up from £70-90 a month to £200, then you’ve got council tax, fuel, it’s like, where does it stop?

“We used to go on days out to North Wales, now if I have a day off it’s like ‘let’s go to the park because it’s free’.”

Friends Irene and Karen showed little enthusiasm for Sir Keir Starmer (Photo: i)

Scott, a care worker, said his standard of living was far better when David Cameron was in power and blames the leadership of Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak for the drop.

He said he will be voting Labour in order to “get the Tories out”.

Back in Dingle, friends Irene and Karen gave Kim Johnson and local Labour councillor Steve Munby a laundry list of complaints they want to see sorted out before they will commit to voting for the party, including a rogue landlord who they believe has 16 people living in a two-up, two down terrace on their street.

Asked about the election, they remain concerned by cost of living pressures.

“I go to work full-time but at the end of the month I’m borrowing,” said Irene. “Starmer, I don’t trust him.

“There’s got to be change, Labour need to stand up for working class people.”

A friend, who declined to give her name, said she had already sent off her postal vote.

“I’ve voted Reform instead of Labour,” she admitted. “My mother will be rolling in her grave, but maybe she would believe me. They’ve done f**k all for this area so I’ve taken a chance on Reform.

“If they do nothing in four years, we’ve not lost anything have we?”