Labour spokeswoman Emily Thornberry quits over 'mocking' post

The British opposition Labour Party's legal affairs spokeswoman was forced to quit her job after posting a picture on Twitter that was perceived as mocking working-class voters.

Emily Thornberry, 54, resigned less than an hour after polling ended in Thursday's Rochester and Strood parliamentary by-election, where she spent the day campaigning. She had posted a photo of a Rochester house displaying three large English St George flags, with a white van parked outside. While her only caption was "Image from Rochester", the post was attacked for mocking working-class voters. "Only Here for the Sneers," read The Sun newspaper's front page yesterday.

"I sent a tweet which has caused offence to some people," Thornberry said in a statement. "That was never my intention and I have apologised. However, I will not let anything distract from Labour's chance to win the coming general election."

UKIP won Thursday's by-election, with Labour placing a distant third in a seat the party had held before 2010.

Chris Bryant, the lawmaker charged with running Labour's campaign in Rochester, said Thornberry had scored "a bit of an own goal. The first rule of politics is you respect the voters, and by Emily's own admission, her tweet clearly didn't do that."