Today’s suspension of the Leicester East CLP couldn’t have come at a better time for Keith Vaz, as just this week, one of his close allies launched a new Leicester political party. Rita Patel, who twice failed in her attempt to oust Labour Mayor and Vaz enemy Peter Soulsby, is back with a vengeance, as the former Labour councillor announced the launch of her One Leicester party this Tuesday. Rita previously tried to abolish the Leicester mayoralty from inside the council, before standing (and losing) as an independent in May’s local elections. Her campaign against Soulsby, who himself has a “long history of quite a difficult relationship“ with Keith Vaz, quickly led locals to dub her the “Keith Vaz Party” candidate. Now that Vaz has lost his local Labour party, this might actually be the new Keith Vaz Party. Their flagship policy is… you guessed it… abolishing the Leicester mayoralty.

Although Jim Keith is keeping his distance so far, local councillors confirmed to Guido that “there are suspicions” Vaz has been pulling the strings behind his protégé’s latest endeavour. We need to get this party started…