PA
Labour MP Sam Tarry has hired a top law firm to fight the party over his coming reselection battle.
The Ilford South MP was “triggered” last month, meaning local party members can vote to keep him as their candidate at the next election or opt for someone else.
But Mr Tarry, the partner of Labour’s deputy leader Angela Rayner, has said he has evidence of “rule-breaking, voter fraud… and the dangerous whipping up of community tensions to undermine the democratic reselection process” and submitted it to the party in July.
He has instructed top solicitors Carter-Ruck, who have previously represented Kevin Spacey, Jeremy Corbyn and former Tory MP Charlie Elphicke, to demand a halt to process until the allegations have been properly investigated by the party.
In a letter to Labour Party General Secretary David Evans, Carter-Ruck said: “We must ask that Mr Tarry receives your detailed and comprehensive response to his email of July 18 2022 and to the matters that it had particularised.
“Quite apart from it clearly being incumbent on the Labour Party to investigate and address such serious allegations of irregularity, this is plainly required in order that Mr Tarry might consider whether the trigger ballot was conducted legitimately and receive advice on the same.
“We add, although it ought to be beyond reasonable contention, there should clearly be no prospect of this process continuing further until the very serious matters raised by our client have been fully resolved.”
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