The Labour MP Dan Jarvis has won a vote to become the party’s candidate for the new role of Sheffield city region mayor, but has yet to decide whether he will step down from parliament to seek election.

The Barnsley Central MP won 58% of the members’ ballot against the other candidate, Ben Curran, a councillor and cabinet member on Sheffield city council.

Jarvis had planned to take no salary if elected as the mayor and stay on as an MP, arguing that the mayoralty as currently set out had very few powers. He had hoped to use his role in Westminster to argue for this to change.

Unlike similar posts in Manchester and the west Midlands, the Sheffield city region job has no devolution or funding deal, because there have been regional disputes over how such a system should work.

However, Labour’s national executive committee ruled on Tuesday that Jarvis would need to quit parliament if he won the mayoralty, a last-minute decision characterised by some as an attempt by the pro-Jeremy Corbyn ruling body to push out an MP who is not close to the party leader.



If Jarvis does decide to quit as an MP, it will open up a safe Labour seat for would-be replacements. At the last general election, he won a majority of more than 15,000, up from 12,000 in 2015. Jarvis first won the seat in a by-election in 2011.

In a tweeted statement, Jarvis thanked Labour members for selecting him. “I am proud to have been chosen, grateful for the opportunity to serve, and pleased to have been part of such a comradely contest,” he said.

Jarvis said the new mayor would “need to work with both local and national government to negotiate the best possible deal for the city of South Yorkshire. Only then will the mayor be able to end the status quo of how decisions are made and how public services are delivered; and use both devolution and cooperative principles to offer a more radical and effective way of serving the public”. The statement did not say whether Jarvis would quit as an MP if he won the mayoralty.

The Labour candidate will be a very strong favourite to win the post; Labour hold two-thirds of the seats on Sheffield council andis even more dominant in surrounding areas.

One possibility is that Jarvis could challenge the NEC’s decision. It is understood the MP and his team have not had a chance to see the full ruling and will not make any decision on what to do until next week at the earliest.

• The subheading of this article was amended on 27 March 2018. The NEC ruled that Dan Jarvis would have to quit parliament if he won the mayoralty, not to run for mayor as an earlier version said.

