Labour is planning to recast Jeremy Corbyn as a left-wing populist in 2017 to capitalise on the post-Brexit, anti-politics mood sweeping the West.
The Labour leader will make more appearances on television and strategists believe his unvarnished approach could help close the yawning gap in the polls with the Conservatives, a party source confirmed.
The party has suffered two stinging by-election results in recent weeks, slumping from second to fourth in Sleaford and North Hykeham, behind Ukip and the Liberal Democrats, and losing its deposit in Richmond Park.
At a Westminster rally for the NHS on Thursday, Mr Corbyn and shadow health secretary Jon Ashworth criticised Ukip's "divisive" new leader Paul Nuttall, accusing him of wanting to privatise the health service.
It marked a potential pivot in approach for Labour, which faces losing northern Brexit-voting seats to Ukip as immigration continues to play a central role in the Brexit debate.
The issue has proved difficult for the party, with leading figures expressing apparently opposing views.
Last weekend, shadow home secretary Diane Abbott recently appeared to support free movement of EU citizens, saying it was "inextricably linked" to access to the European single market, which Labour is demanding.
But Manchester mayoral candidate Andy Burnham has spoken of the need to end free movement, which he says has had a disproportionate impact on northern de-industrialised communities.
Labour's election co-ordinator Jon Trickett said the party was already placing itself on a war footing in expectation of a snap general election in 2017.
He told the Guardian: "Theresa May has said there will not be a snap election; that doesn't mean there won't be an early election.
"It's our job to be ready. We're ramping up the organisation now. There's a great deal of analytical work going on behind the scenes."
Mr Trickett added: "We need to frame an argument about Britain, its past, present and future - but we will be doing that in a carefully modulated way."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel