Gen Kitchen interview: ‘I’ll always be the challenger’

We sat down with Labour's new MP to find out what's been happening since she was elected

By Sarah Ward

Gen Kitchen speaking to an Irchester resident with Labour party member Tony Aslam (right)

Three months ago Gen Kitchen was elected as Wellingborough and Rushden’s MP, becoming Labour’s only Northamptonshire parliamentarian and breaking the Conservatives winning run that had seen Peter Bone elected five times since 2005.

But while for most MPs victory at the ballot box means four years of job security, because she was elected in these dog days of the current Conservative administration’s tenure, in less than nine months time Gen Kitchen will have to ask constituents for their vote again.

I met up with her in her constituency for her canvassing session yesterday morning before she headed down to Westminster. We ended up at the Pear Tree Cafe of Irchester for an interview, which was regularly punctuated by interruptions from an enthusiastic Labour supporter, who having seen her on the telly was thrilled to find his new MP in his regular cafe. (Note, she was very kind and accommodating, speaking to him about the state of the country, his opinions on the Corbyn years and what Labour needs to do to win the General Election).

The canvassing team.

When I ask her how she is finding the new job she says:

“It is like an ongoing job interview all the time. 

“So, it’s a job interview with your constituents, with your new colleagues on both sides of the house. It is hard but Wellingborough is not naturally the party of Labour and for me I am the challenger and I will always be the challenger. So even when I am the incumbent it is making sure that we don’t lose that fire, drive and motivation because we can’t relax.”

It will be her 100th day in office on May 29 and she says since being elected she has been concentrating on getting started on her manifesto pledges. She has met with the leader of North Northamptonshire Council Jason Smithers about the state of the county’s roads - potholes were on her manifesto - and has been trying to help tackle the county’s knife crime issue by meeting with local organisations involved in prevention.

Last week charity Off the Streets, which was formed in the aftermath of the 2021 murder of Wellingborough teenager Dylan Holliday, was invited by Gen Kitchen down to parliament.

She says most of the case work has been about parks and highways, but it is the issue of the NHS and GP appointments that are being brought up most often on the doorstep. Soon she will be convening a round table with GP surgeries from across her constituency to find out how she can help and what lobbying she can do.

She is also in the process of setting up a parliamentary debate about an urgent care centre at Isebrook - an undelivered pledge of former MP Peter Bone. She says the petition will ‘at least be a starting point’.

At Westminster she has been given some roles. She is now a shadow parliamentary private secretary in the Home Office, working for Labour veteran Yvette Cooper, and is a member of the education select committee. This will see her scrutinise government policy and get a clear understanding of the issues, with the national problems in Special Educational Needs provision top of the committee’s focus.

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She has had some flak locally for her seeming lack of presence since she was elected.

Perhaps this is due to her huge profile in the byelection, in which her face seemed to be everywhere. The country’s media descended to watch her win the seat, as it was seen as an indication of the national mood and whether Labour could overturn the tories stonking majority. But when she was elected, the media glare departed and there was not a huge amount of communication from her.

The media attention on the Wellingborough byelection was huge.

A message pinned to her X account asked constituents to be patient while she set up her constituency office.

And she is conscious of what people have been saying. But does not shy away from questions on it. Rather than the vanilla sentences many MPs will string together in an interview she seemed pretty transparent and throughout our chat nothing appeared to be off limits.

On the accusations of ‘disappearing’ she says: 

“What is very much a shock, is that when you come in - you have no staff. And therefore in my first week I put out my jobs, then I had four weeks for people to apply, three weeks of interviews and then I had notices for people to work and parliamentary vetting - so it took a good two months. I have asked other MPs if they could lend me some staff to try and get things up and running.

“So I can totally get why the public perception is, ‘she has just gone to Westminster’ but  I haven’t.”

The Pear Tree Cafe of Irchester was where we had our chat.

In an interview with NN Journal before her election, she committed to holding local surgeries and has begun doing them since her officer manager started.

But they are by appointment only and so far take place solely in Wellingborough, although she plans to move them around the area. She has had some communications from people that Labour’s regional media office has termed as stalking.  

She says:

“We have had some individuals that we have had to refer to the police. We have had someone who thinks we are friends. But has drawn me in different places that are concerning, so we’ve had to highlight that. Equally parliament security services say ‘don't do a surgery until you have someone else to do it with’. They offer you six foot bouncers and I want to have them - but I do not want to be on my own.

“We have them by appointment only because everyone who comes in for a surgery, we have to let police know who is there, just in case anything happens. If you think about what happened with Jo Cox and David Amess [both MPs were murdered] actually it was in the constituency and around the surgery that it happened and that is just the process we have to go through now.”

She is keen to be joined in parliament by more Northants Labour MPs, and is friends with many of the party’s candidates. Northampton South candidate Mike Reader was a witness at her recent wedding and she jokes about sharing a ‘pink’ flat with Kettering’s Labour candidate Rosie Wrighting if both are elected at the General Election.

It is a crucial time for Labour - as the country must vote in a new government before the end of January next year - and this one is expected to deliver a new crop of red MPs. It will be followed by unitary council elections in 2025 which could see Northants’ Conservative run authorities turn a different shade.

She says:

“It’s a really exciting prospect for us a Labour party, but equally we need to be really professional and we need to make sure our council candidates are of the right standards because what I don’t want to happen is that we have a red tide, but we actually we have not done proper vetting or got the proper strategy in place.”

But for now, in the months running up to the election she wants to make herself visible and get stuck into the casework. After all, as anyone living in Northants knows - there are lots of potholes to deal with.