Journalist Paul Mason joins Labour race in Sheffield Central

The former Channel 4 News economics editor Paul Mason has become the latest high-profile name to seek the Labour nomination to contest the safe Sheffield Central seat at the next general election.

Mason, an alumnus of Sheffield University who is closely associated with the Jeremy Corbyn era, joins the comedian Eddie Izzard, plus a local dentist, a Somali refugee, a former aid worker and several local councillors, in the race to replace Paul Blomfield, who is stepping down after 12 years as an MP.

Blomfield, who won a 27,273 majority in 2019, is expected to endorse Abtisam Mohamed, a councillor, lawyer and community organiser who moved to Sheffield from Yemen as a toddler in the 1980s when her father got a job in the local steel industry.

Sheffield insiders think that neither Mason nor Izzard have a chance of winning the nomination, noting that the city has a long history of choosing local candidates rather than outsiders. David Blunkett, who ran Sheffield city council before becoming Sheffield Brightside’s MP and ultimately home secretary, has endorsed Mohamed.

Jayne Dunn, another local councillor who has won the endorsements of the GMB and Aslef unions, is seen as Mohamed’s main rival. Dunn says she is “not a typical politician”; she was once a homeless single mother on benefits. She ran to be Labour’s candidate for the South Yorkshire mayoralty but lost to Oliver Coppard.

Labour’s national executive committee will decide on the longlist within the next week. Then, the executive of the constituency Labour party (CLP) will largely be in charge of the shortlist.

Izzard, who was a student at Sheffield University 40 years ago, has held a series of events around the city over the last week, drawing the attention of gender-critical feminists who oppose her identifying as a woman after becoming famous as a crossdressing man.

It has wrongly been claimed that Izzard is competing on an all-women shortlist. These can only be imposed when fewer than half of all Labour MPs are women, which is not currently the case. This is an open selection.

One local Labour insider said they did not think Izzard’s trans identity would have much bearing on whether she was selected, but they thought her chances of making the shortlist were low. “It’s just the fact she’s not done anything local and doesn’t know how to run in a selection. She could have moved here a year ago but she didn’t and people notice that kind of stuff,” they said.

Mason announced his candidacy on Monday. Despite his association with the left of the Labour party, on his website he says he was one of the first people to join Keir Starmer’s leadership campaign.

Others who have gone public with their candidacies for Sheffield Central are Rizwana Lala, a dentist; Abdi Suleiman, who came to Sheffield as a child refugee from Somalia and went on to be president of the Sheffield University students’ union; and Mike Buckley, a former aid worker.

Sheffield Central has about 2,000 members. Though Corbynites held influence during his reign, the CLP endorsed Starmer in the 2020 leadership election. Students are unusually influential in general elections in the constituency, after Blomfield spearheaded an initiative with the city’s universities that made it easier for students to be added to the electoral roll when they began their studies.

In 2019, the Conservatives came a distant second and the Greens third in Sheffield Central, which used to be a Lib Dem/Labour marginal. In 2010, Blomfield won a majority of just 165, but he leaves with Labour’s biggest majority in Yorkshire.