A TRADE unionist who stood against Dorset’s sole Labour MP as he defended a wafer-thin majority has been readmitted to the party and taken a post on its local executive.

Berny Parkes left Labour and stood for George Galloway’s Respect party at the 2005 general election, when South Dorset MP Jim Knight was defending a majority of just 153 votes.

The MP bucked a national trend by increasing his majority despite the challenge, with Mr Parkes polling 219 votes – only for Labour to lose the seat in 2010.

Mr Parkes, chairman of Unison in Dorset, re-joined the party in the wake of Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership campaign last year and is now on the executive of South Dorset Constituency Labour Party.

The party voted by 55-40 to nominate Jeremy Corbyn rather than his leadership challenger Owen Smith.

Former Labour councillor Rachel Rogers said Mr Parkes’ decision to stand against a sitting MP at a general election was “a surprising thing to do if you are committed to electing a Labour government”.

She said: “Fortunately, Jim was re-elected with an increased majority while Mr Parkes garnered just over 200 votes, which I suspect says something about the appetite amongst the South Dorset electorate for far-left politics.”

She added: “However it is worth noting that Labour has only ever won at a general election in South Dorset under Tony Blair's leadership and that it has lost two council seats since Mr Corbyn's election as leader of the Labour party.”

Mr Parkes, who was a Labour member for around 20 years before leaving over the Iraq war, said of his appointment: “It’s not really being elected, it’s voluntary really. I wasn’t standing against any other candidate to get onto the executive.”

He said the party had changed dramatically. “South Dorset have just nominated Jeremy Corbyn as leader; at the last leadership election we nominated Yvette Cooper. There’s a change,” he said.

“There are people who’ve joined the party because they believe in what Jeremy Corbyn’s offering. It’s all about a party that’s virtually doubled its membership.”

He insisted Mr Corbyn’s party could win Conservative-held seats such as South Dorset at a general election. “If you talk about people who don’t usually go out and vote, or people who are soft on their votes and change because of what’s changing in society and their life, they can be convinced to vote for Jeremy,” he said.