Ex-Countryfile presenter and ageism campaigner Miriam O’Reilly to stand as Labour MP

(PA)

Miriam O’Reilly, the former BBC Countryfile presenter who successfully took the corporation to an employment tribunal after being dropped from its flagship rural affairs show, is to seek election as a Labour MP.

Ms O’Reilly, who won a landmark ageism case against the BBC, will put herself forward for selection as Labour’s candidate in the West Midlands seat of Nuneaton at the 2015 general election.

Ms O’Reilly, 55, told the Coventry Telegraph: “I’ve been fighting for the rights of older women in the workplace. I’m going to bring all the fighting spirit and guts it took to take on the BBC to fighting for the people of Nuneaton.”

She added: “I’ve been here for two months keeping a low profile and finding out about what matters to the people. I’ve really got under the skin of Nuneaton.”

The incumbent Conservative MP Marcus Jones took the seat in 2010 with a 2,069 majority.

Last year Ms O’Reilly joined a Labour Party commission examining discrimination against older women, led by deputy leader Harriet Harman.

A former Radio Four Women’s Hour presenter, Ms O’Reilly was offered three-year deal to return to the BBC but quit after nine months saying that the opportunities she had been offered had been “clearly just a PR damage-limitation exercise”.