Keir Starmer, Lisa Nandy, Jess Phillips and Emily Thornberry are all running for leader

Outsider Lisa Nandy gained ground in the Labour leadership race with a performance in the first hustings of contest that impressed MPs.

A poll of Labour members last week put her in last place with just 5% support, with Sir Keir Starmer in front with 31% and Rebecca Long-Bailey second with 20%.

But after a 90-minute hustings before Labour MPs and peers in the Commons, many of those present left the meeting praising the performance of the Wigan MP.

In a hustings in which the mood among MPs was surprisingly buoyant considering the scale of Labour's election defeat, Jess Phillips, Clive Lewis and Emily Thornberry also took part.

During the meeting, former Scottish first minister Jack McConnell tweeted: "Best overall analysis and solutions from @lisanandy. Brave and principled. Looks and sounds like a leader for the future every day."


And former Labour cabinet minister Peter Hain tweeted: "Brilliant reception in PLP (Parliamentary Labour Party) for @lisanandy for her powerful speech to rousing applause."

Several MPs and peers also told Sky News after the hustings that while all six candidates performed well, they had been impressed by Ms Nandy's strong performance.

And although Sir Keir is still 8/11 favourite with bookmakers Sky Bet, with Ms Long-Bailey in second place on 5/2, Ms Nandy's odds have now been cut from 10/1 to 7/1.

Long-Bailey: 'I'm nobody's continuity candidate'

In her well-received opening statement, Ms Nandy told the Labour MPs and peers packed into a Commons committee room: "This leadership debate is possibly the most important in our history.

"Now is not the time to steady the ship. If we do not change course we will die and we will deserve to."

And in an attack on Jeremy Corbyn's inner circle's election strategy, she said: "Never again can we get factions and friends of the leader determining where resources go."

In his opening statement, Sir Keir, the shadow Brexit secretary and early front runner in the contest, said: "We need to win back our heartlands.

"We need to understand and to address each and every reason we lost at this election, but we also need to win back Scotland, we need to win back seats in Wales, and if you draw a line from London to Bristol and look south we only have a handful seats.

"So, we have got a mountain to climb."

Image: Clive Lewis has also entered the leadership race

Sir Keir's main challenger, shadow business secretary Ms Long-Bailey, said that in losing the election, Labour "let down the people who rely on us".

She said: "Our number one duty as Labour MPs is to learn the lessons of defeat and make sure we don't repeat them.

"We lost because our compromise position on Brexit was seen by Leavers as an attempt to undo the referendum result, without satisfying Remainers.

"We lost because too few voters thought Labour spoke for them, and because they didn't trust us to deal with antisemitism.

"And we lost because we didn't do a good enough job at convincing voters that our popular policies were credible and deliverable, or come up with a framing and slogan that could match Johnson's simple pledge to 'Get Brexit Done'."

'The argument about leave and remain goes with Brexit'

Earlier, Ms Long-Bailey appeared to undermine her claim that she was "nobody's continuity candidate" in an interview with ITV in which she was asked how she would rate Mr Corbyn as a leader out of ten.

She replied: "I thought Corbyn was one of most honest kind principled politicians I've ever met. I'd give him 10 out of 10, because I respect him and I supported him all the way through."

But Corbyn critic Ms Phillips won applause when she told the hustings: "I don't want to be the leader of the Opposition. I want to be Prime Minister. I want to be Prime Minister to change people's lives."