SHADOW cabinet member Jon Trickett has revealed Labour bosses kept him off TV during the election campaign — because he has a northern accent.

Mr Trickett, who is from Leeds and represents Hemsworth in Yorkshire, made the shocking disclosure at a Class think tank meeting on Tuesday evening.

He told the meeting that the cultural “gulf” between MPs and the public was part of the reason for Labour’s defeat.

“Even if they’re saying things that are progressive, it’s hard for people to hear because the language, the idioms, the accents, the way they dress, everything about them feels like Westmisnter,” he said.

And Mr Trickett said Labour’s top brass are now even discriminating against the party’s own working-class MPs.

He said: “I’m a plumber by the way, and though I was very close to the leadership, I wasn’t allowed on the TV. I wonder why?

“The people who went on the telly for Labour don’t talk like me.

“Maybe that’s because I’m crap at talking, but it feels to me like there is a gulf between the population and political class.”

An analysis of voting figures by Mr Trickett revealed last week that Labour was more dependent on middle-class support than ever at this election.

Unite assistant general secretary Steve Turner said that was because Labour had treated its working-class voters with “criminal neglect.”

“There’s a real disengagement with our party and our core vote and we’ve got to address that,” he told the meeting.

“There’s loads of lessons but we won’t be taking them from Blair or Mandelson, or any of their other cronies, who lost us five million votes.”