FORMER Ilkley MP Ann Cryer is to stand for election in Ilkley in this spring’s district council elections.

Labour Party members in Ilkley have invited the veteran politician to campaign for the Bradford Council seat.

Mrs Cryer, 75, represented the Keighley constituency, which includes Ilkley, in the House of Commons from 1997 to 2010.

She remains actively involved in politics, and in 2012 she unsuccessfully campaigned for the Ilkley ward in the Bradford Council elections.

Mrs Cryer this week said she had been very happy to accept the latest invitation from Ilkley Labour members.

She admitted that the Ilkley ward was never an easy one to contest for the party, since the town is traditionally a Conservative stronghold.

But she said she had gained a “staggering” amount of support in Ilkley during her days as Keighley’s MP, mostly due to her work for Ilkley residents from all walks of life.

She said: “I was a cracking good constituency MP and I know people in Ilkley remember that. They knew I didn’t regard them as the outback. I had regular surgeries there.”