Labour has suffered a new blow after Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner was suspended by one of the party’s biggest supporters.
The Unite union has also voted to re-examine its relationship with the party in what could develop into a wider test of the union movement’s loyalty to Labour. Unite could cut millions of pounds of funding.
Action to suspend Ms Rayner came after she intervened in the long-running Birmingham bin strike, calling on the union to agree to a pay deal which the union’s members have rejected.
Ms Rayner’s supporters said she had cancelled her direct debit to Unite several months ago and the last payment was taken in April, meaning there was no membership status to suspend.
However, even if symbolic, the union’s action marks a new tension between Labour and the trades unions. There has been dismay over the axeing of the winter fuel allowance, now partly restored, and the attempt to cut disability benefits.
The Birmingham bin dispute has become a test of “fire and rehire” practices which Labour said it would outlaw.
At the union’s policy conference in Brighton on Friday an emergency motion was passed which criticised Birmingham’s Labour council and Sir Keir Starmer’s government.
The motion suspended the membership of Ms Rayner, as well as Birmingham council leader John Cotton and a number of councillors.
Unite is the largest union affiliated to the Labour Party. General secretary Sharon Graham said: “Unite is crystal clear it will call out bad employers regardless of the colour of their rosette.
“Angela Rayner has had every opportunity to intervene and resolve this dispute but has instead backed a rogue council that has peddled lies and smeared its workers fighting huge pay cuts.
“The disgraceful actions of the government and a so-called Labour council, is essentially fire and rehire and makes a joke of the Employment Relations Act promises.
“People up and down the country are asking whose side is the Labour government on and coming up with the answer: not workers.”
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