Labour’s Dan Norris, who is set to battle Jacob Rees-Mogg to become North East Somerset and Hanham MP, has said there would be “a period of overlap” with his position as West of England Metro Mayor if he is elected.

Mr Norris was the MP for Wansdyke from 1997 to 2010, when the constituency was replaced by North East Somerset, which Mr Norris lost to Conservative Jacob Rees-Mogg. But now he has been selected as the Labour candidate for that seat.

Mr Norris said: “It’s the place I care most about in the whole world. Its where I grew up. It’s given me a lot and I want to do more to give back to the community.”

He has lived near the village of Pensford for 25 years. He said: “I understand the communities. They are all very important to me and they see things in very different ways.”

Mr Norris said:  “This has been a highly marginal Labour/Tory contest for the last three decades and if people want an alternative to the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats will have to vote Labour to make that happen.”

Since 2021, Mr Norris has been the Metro Mayor of the West of England, an area including North East Somerset and Hanham. He said he had decided to try and win back his former seat after 14 years of Tory government.

He said: “There’s 1,001 reasons and 70,000 people in the new constituency I want to help.”

And on Jacob Rees-Mogg, who unseated him 14 years ago, Mr Norris said: “I know him and we get on fine. He’s my constituent and I am his.”

“I think he takes a keen interest in his constituency. It’s not that that concerns me, it’s the Tory record and he has been defending that. We have got to get Britain’s future back.”

If he was elected, Mr Norris said he would stay on as Metro Mayor, for which his term in office runs until 2025. He said: “I think it would be totally wasteful of taxpayers money to have a bye-lection. So I think there would have to be a period of overlap”

He said his main achievement in the role was the birthday bus scheme, under which people living in the West of England and North Somerset can sign up for a pass to give them free bus travel in the month of their birthday.

Mr Norris said that in boosting bus user numbers, it had helped tackle congestion and air pollution in the area. He said: “It’s important to get people out of their cars and its also helped those who are totally reliant on public transport in a cost of living crisis.”

“I know from being the Metro Mayor, if there wasn’t a Conservative government we would be able to do so much more.”

Buses have been a particular battleground in rural North East Somerset which was hit by a number of cuts to publicly-supported bus services.