SACKED Commons leader Lucy Powell has surged into a commanding lead in the race to be deputy leader of the Labour Party.

A survey by Labour List put her 17 per cent ahead of her only rival, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson.

This is a serious embarrassment to Keir Starmer, who sacked Ms Powell from the Cabinet, without explanation, just two weeks ago. Her victory would be seen as a rebuke by party members to his floundering premiership.

Ms Powell is using the freedom of the back benches to discreetly distance herself from the government she was so recently a member of, which seems to be what most Labour members want to hear.

She is expected to urge her former colleagues to be clearer about their desire to lift the cruel two-child benefit cap, “the single biggest policy we could do to address child poverty.”

Ms Powell is backed by Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham, now widely seen as a leading rival to Sir Keir, and his newly founded Mainstream organisation.

However, Ms Powell insists that her race against Ms Phillipson is not a proxy battle between Burnham and Starmer, which she criticised as a “sexist” framing of the contest.

She told her local paper, the Manchester Evening News: “Woe betide anyone who wants to try and tell me that I’m subservient to some other man. I’m probably more alpha male than most men I know.”

The two candidates are now soliciting nominations of local parties and affiliated trade unions, following which they will go to a ballot of the membership next month.