Bridget Phillipson’s move to replace Angela Rayner as deputy leader of the Labour Party is a flex aimed at showing No 10 there is life after Sir Keir Starmer .

When Rayner resigned on Friday , Labour was left with two vacancies. The first was in her formal role as deputy leader of the Labour Party, which Starmer has tried to downgrade by swiftly appointing David Lammy as Deputy Prime Minister – and declining to guarantee the new party deputy will be awarded a Cabinet position.

The second opening is as the most senior member of the party, with links to the trades union movement and the status that implies as one of the party’s prospective leaders-in-waiting. Phillipson , having suffered from negative briefing against her earlier in the year from some quarters of No 10, is also

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