Manish Sood, an Indian-origin Labour candidate who is at the centre of a storm for calling Gordon Brown the “worst Prime Minister” Britain has ever had, said his humiliation within the party forced him to make such remarks hours before the May 6 election.
A day after making comments against Mr. Brown, Mr. Sood said, “I am more Old Labour while the party is now New Labour, so our views clashed. They have tried to have me deselected three times. I felt disrespected, dishonoured and degraded. That is why I chose this week to make my remarks,” he said.
Mr. Sood, 38, is the Labour candidate in North-west Norfolk.
His remark about Mr. Brown caused considerable embarrassment to Mr. Brown and the Labour party that is struggling in opinion polls. The party is widely expected to lose power after 13 years in office.
Mr. Sood’s mother, Manjula Sood, who until recently was Britain’s first Asian woman to hold the office Lord Mayor in Leicester, was distraught at her son’s remarks.
She said: “I think he has a lot of anger inside him. I didn’t know what his views were until this morning when a friend called me and said I should turn on the TV news. When I saw him on screen I felt gutted, I was distraught.”
“I was also very angry. The key thing about the Labour Party is that you must be loyal. Manish has not been loyal and he has caused trouble with a day to go until a General Election,” she said.
“I am a proud Labour member and Labour councillor. His late father was a proud party member. This is not what we expected of Manish,” she added.
Mr. Sood, however, said he was surprised by the storm created in the media across the world by his comments against Mr. Brown.
He said he received an angry call from trade secretary Peter Mandelson, but he stood by his remarks during the heated conversation.
“I expected a quiet day. I planned to do a bit of decorating at home. But then my phone started ringing from 7am onwards. Sky News, the BBC, media from around the world, they all wanted to interview me. I didn’t expect my comments to be so controversial,” he said.
“When Lord Mandelson called me he was furious. He was shouting. He completely lost his temper. I had to tell him to cool down. He told me my views were not those shared by the Labour Party, and that I was wrong,” Mr. Sood said.
“I told him my views were in the Labour manifestos of the 60s and 70s. Those are real Labour values. I told him I was going to stick by what I said, and he slammed the phone down,” he added.
Leader of Leicester City Council Veejay Patel also criticised Mr. Sood’s comments and said: “The comments Manish made don’t represent the Labour Party’s views. Our party has its own rules and regulations which he appears to have broken.”
Privately, senior regional Labour figures said Mr. Sood could be expelled from the party.
But, Mr. Sood said: “If they kick me out that would be classed as anarchy. The Queen would not be happy. I don’t think they would dare to do that. I’ve had a lot of abuse from people who are angry at my comments.”
