THE MP for Hove and Portslade said the Labour Party has “got the message” after a series of crushing defeats to the Tories.

Peter Kyle’s party suffered a humiliating by-election in Hartlepool which elected a Conservative MP for the first time in 62 years.

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer carried out a reshuffle of his shadow cabinet team yesterday, as the fallout over the party’s dismal election performance continues.

Speaking to BBC South East, Mr Kyle said: “I think people think that the Labour Party talks too much about people who are really struggling, in their words, at the bottom.

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“We obsess too much about taking money off people at the top. We don’t talk enough about those huge groups of people in the middle who are really hardworking who I have been speaking to across our country in this election.

“I’m talking about families who have big mortgages, they’re hardworking, both parents working, kids who are trying to get into a good school and deserve a great education, and they don’t have much of a disposable income and they don’t see us fighting for them.

“They don’t see the Labour Party talking enough about where wealth comes from, where we’re going to create wealth. They see us talking too much about how we want to spend money.

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“This is the reason Keir Starmer has launched a policy review so everything is on the table. People will see the acceleration of the change within the Labour Party.

“For the last year, I think during the pandemic we under-estimated the notice that people were taking to the change of the Labour Party and we under-

estimated the impact that Boris Johnson’s bumbling positivity has in a campaign.

“We got the message, change will come faster and I can guarantee that I am excited about that change and re-rooting ourselves not just across the South East of England, but across our country too.”