The Islington councillor was announced as Labour’s candidate for Islington North
The Labour candidate taking on Jeremy Corbyn in Islington North at the General Election has now been announced. Praful Nargund was chosen as the party’s parliamentary candidate last Friday, hours after former Labour leader Corbyn announced he would be standing as an independent.
Reacting to the announcement, Nargund wrote on X: “It’s an honour to have been chosen as Labour’s candidate for Islington North and I look forward to the campaign ahead. I promise to be a truly local MP, that represents all families and businesses that call this special place their home.
“Only Labour can change the country and fix 14 years of Tory failure.”
Nargund has been a councillor in Islington since May 2022 and has sat on the Policy and Performance Committee and the Licensing Committee. He is also on Islington council’s health, wellbeing and adult social care scrutiny committee and has said on his website how he grew up in an NHS family and knows “how important it is that we solve the problems of staff shortages”.
He worked as Chief Executive of abc ivf, a chain of 15 clinics founded by his mother Geeta. Nargund’s website says that he is “using my experience to champion policies for a skills revolution for young people”, and that he has spent a decade “using innovation to tackle inequalities in fertility treatment.”
On the list for Labour’s Barnsbury councillors, Nargund is referred to as an entrepreneur and campaigner with a focus on “revolutionising the skills system, to improve access to opportunities”. He also sits on Labour’s Council of Skills Advisors.
So far, Nargund has remained unforthcoming with talking to the press, with the Islington Tribune newspaper stating it had received “total silence” from the candidate hopeful since approaching him repeatedly for comment about his ambition to represent the constituency.
The candidate choice came despite a ballot of members initially being planned over the next week, to choose between Nargund and the other shortlisted candidate Sem Moema. However LabourList reported that the National Executive Committee (NEC) sped up the process with the fast approaching election and selected Nargund.
It comes after the NEC decided to bar current MP Jeremy Corbyn from standing for Labour again.
(Image credit: Labour Party / YouTube screenshot)
Hannah Davenport is news reporter at Left Foot Forward
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