The chairman of Keith Vaz’s Leicester East Constituency Labour Party, Councillor John Thomas has written to Jennie Formby, the party’s General Secretary, cancelling his membership of the Labour Party after 30 years and resigning as the chairman of the Leicester East CLP.

“This is great disappointment to me, realising that I have spent over 30 years of my life working for a party that I now know that I have nothing in common with. This is not the party I joined, the party for decent working people. I can no longer follow the clown that leads the Labour Party, he is heavily influenced by the Trotskyite Len McCluskey and is now as the Hoki Coki leader, in out, and shake it all about he has turned this great party into a laughing stock.

Please cancel the direct debit made in favour of your party by me and return all money’s taken by you through Leicester City Council Labour Group to me. I am also shocked that you have chosen a candidate who is a Councillor in Jeremy Corbyn’s Islington CLP to be the Labour Candidate for Leicester East for the next General Election. Where is the democracy in all this? It is a fix and a disgrace.”