There is another vacancy at the top of the Labor Party after General Secretary Hollie Ridley told staff she is stepping down to allow a replacement to “work alongside a new leader once they are elected”. The role of the general secretary is central to Labour’s fundraising and elections, as well as overseeing the party’s internal governance. Ridley, an ally of Keir Starmer, was elected in a snap, single-candidate election shortly after Labour’s 2024 election win.
Labor leader-in-waiting Andy Burnham will be hoping to make his political mark on the party through the next general secretary. The National Executive Committee will now be tasked with electing a new general secretary to take over after a ratification vote at the annual conference in September.
Here are the names currently floating around:
Joe Fortune
Fortune is currently General Secretary of the Co-operative Party, Labour’s sister party. The Liverpudlian has been entrusted with the financial and organizational turnaround of the party since taking up the role in 2019. With Andy Burnham set to become the first Labor and Co-Op MP to serve as Labor leader (and prime minister), it would make sense for him to bring in a key figure from the Co-op, given Joe Fortune’s similar political secrets. Next year marks a century of the Co-operation Party’s electoral alliance with Labour, so his appointment would be a fitting end to that relationship.
Christina McAnea
McAnea became Unison’s first female general secretary in 2021 and was once ranked by New statesman as one of the ten most powerful left-wingers in Britain. But she lost her job last year after being defeated in the Unison leadership election by Andrea Egan, a left-wing challenger. It was an abrupt end to a long career in the labor movement, but the role of general secretary would be a natural second act.
John Lehal
Former party chief operating officer Lehal made a bid for the role in September 2024 but was passed over in favor of Ridley. He is expected to make clear his continued interest in the role this time around, although he is not currently employed by the party and works as an independent consultant.
Claire Reynolds
Reynolds worked in Starmer’s No 10 as the main liaison between support group MPs and the government. She stepped down from the role after the breakdown of relations during the 2025 welfare rebellion and moved to a senior role at Labor Party headquarters. Reynolds previously chaired the Labor Women’s Network and the role of general could be a natural step.
Wild cards:
Anthony Lavelle
Lavelle was a key organizer of Burnham’s successful Makerfield by-election campaign and currently serves as director of the Labor Party in the North West (in this role, his name was in lowercase on all of Burnham’s campaign posters). He is also a Labor councilor in Liverpool. Taking the role of general would be a rapid rise for Lavelle and a further sign of the party’s geographic tilt from London to the north west of England.
Lisa Johnson
A former director of the GMB union, Johnson was tipped for the role of general secretary in 2020 following the election of Keir Starmer as leader. She has since moved on to a role in the private sector at Starship Technologies, a robotics firm. Can she be persuaded to re-enter the world of Labor politics?
Steve Rotheram (or another Metro chairman)
Appointing a serving metro mayor would be another strong signal of Burnham’s commitment to devolution, plus he is close to all the other metro mayors and is often said to have acted as their de facto leader in discussions with the government at the Council of Nations and Regions. Rotheram is particularly close to Burnham – they even wrote a book together. But the Labor Party rulebook stipulates that the general must devote his full time to the role, so both places would not be considered acceptable.
(Further reading: The Greens are ready to fight Andy Burnham)
