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The MP Karl Turner has lost the Labour whip, after making a series of interventions criticising Keir Starmer and No 10, especially changes to jury trials.
Turner had been informed by the chief whip, Jonathan Reynolds, that he had had the whip suspended because of his conduct, a Labour source said. Turner denied he had been informed by the whips and said he had learnt about his suspension from journalists.
The decision is understood to have been prompted in part by an interview given by Turner, the MP for Hull East, to Jody McIntyre, a campaigner who stood at the 2024 elections against Labour’s Jess Phillips.
Turner wrote on X: “I am being told that I have had the whip suspended but I have not had any notification from the whips about this. It seems journalists have been told but I have not.”
A Labour source denied the suspension was due to Turner’s opposition to the judicial reforms and said there had been complaint about his conduct online as well as in Parliament from other MPs.
Turner, who had been shadow solicitor general but was not given a government role, was opposed to reforms from the Ministry of Justice to cut the number of jury trials and introduce new judge-only courts – including threatening to quit and force a byelection.
Turner said the reforms were deeply misguided and said he had at least 60 MPs prepared to vote against the reforms, though he abstained at the second reading of the bill in the hope of prompting changes during the parliamentary process.
He cited his own experience of the criminal justice system having been charged with handling stolen goods, a case that was thrown out due to lack of evidence.
Turner has previously said he was on a “conduct warning” from the whips and has suggested he would be minded to spark a byelection if he was suspended.
He has been explicitly critical of Number 10 in recent months whom he had accused of briefing against him, especially the former chief of staff Morgan McSweeney. He has called him “McSwindle” online and suggested he staged the stealing of a mobile phone.
In the interview with McIntyre, Turner made other allegations saying McSweeney was “still running the job” in the background, and that several MPs are “very angry” about the situation.
McIntyre stood against Phillips in Birmingham Yardley, on a platform critcising Labour’s approach to the Israeli attacks on Gaza. Phillips won by just 700 votes.
On the night of the election, Phillips criticised the conduct of her opponent after heckles during her victory speech saying: “I see we’re going to continue with the class we had during the campaign … I didn’t bring my children here tonight, because I knew this would happen and they deserve better.”
