Tory candidate for flagship City seat accuses Lib Dem Chuka of being ‘parachuted in’

Westminster council leader Nickie Aiken
Nigel Howard
WEST END FINAL

Get our award-winning daily news email featuring exclusive stories, opinion and expert analysis

I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard. Read our privacy notice.

The Conservative candidate for the flagship seat of Cities of London and Westminster today accused her Liberal Democrat rival Chuka Umunna of having been “parachuted” in to fight the contest.

Nickie Aiken, the leader of Westminster council, was selected last night as the Tory contender for the plum seat, and swiftly took aim at Mr Umunna, the MP for Streatham who left Labour this year.

“Voters have got a clear choice,” she said. “They can have a local resident who has lived here for two decades and served Westminster for over a decade or they can have somebody parachuted in who knows nothing about our constituency and is on his fourth political party in ten months.”

Former City lawyer Mr Umunna quit Labour in February and formed an Independent Group and then shortly afterwards Change UK — The Independent Group.

Chuka Umunna speaks at the Liberal Democrat Conference
Getty Images

Tory Mark Field won the seat in 2017 with a majority of 3,148, gaining 18,005 votes, to Labour’s 14,857, with the Lib Dems on 4,270.

Mr Umunna is a high-profile candidate and the Lib Dems believe they can win in the Remain stronghold.

He said: “I was born and raised in London, and I have worked in Cities of London and Westminster all my adult life, first as an employment lawyer, then as an MP — that is not something the Tory candidate can say.

“But the real question in this election is who has the best policies, and by standing for the Conservatives in this election the Tory candidate is endorsing Brexit and happy to stand on a local record of a 16 per cent rise in rough sleeping, the worst air quality for NO2 levels in London and the Met Police budget cut every year from 2015 to 2019.”

Ms Aiken said her priorities would be tackling rough sleeping and toxic air, and seeking to build a strong economy to boost jobs.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in

MORE ABOUT