Labour’s techy MP for Newcastle Central Chi Onwurah has taken to Twitter to confirm with her constituents who they’d like her to select for the new Labour leader after Ed Miliband’s resignation.
Having already chosen to get behind Rushanara Ali for the deputy leader post, highlighting in a blog for the New Statesman the commitment she believes her colleague has to building “new digital tools” for democracy, Onwurah has likewise headed online to demonstrate her belief in the power of tech.
Onwurah had already asked the members of her local Labour Party who she should get behind and found her Twitter followers were also overwhelmingly in favour of left-wing candidate Jeremy Corben.
Onwurah led the Labour Digital Government Review, which reported last year. She is also a chartered engineer and was the former head of telecoms technology for Ofcom.
Having won re-election in May, she is back in the shadow cabinet office leading on cyber security, social entrepreneurship and open government.
Onwurah’s home town is a growing regional tech hub, giving birth to the FTSE 100 company Sage, who are supporters of the Ignite 100 accelerator within the Campus North coworking space. It’s also the city where the Dynamo tech network and Venturefest North East are based.
Among other initiatives, Newcastle University has brought together £40m to build a National Centre for Ageing Science and Innovation in the city.