Labour’s Left: If Tory turncoat is welcome, why can’t Sir Keir let Corbyn back in?

LABOUR Left-wingers are this week poised to mount a challenge to Sir Keir Starmer’s authority by bidding to restore the party whip to Jeremy Corbyn.

They claim that banning the former leader from sitting as a Labour MP is ‘unjustifiable’ now that Tory defector Christian Wakeford – who reportedly once branded Labour ‘a bunch of ‘c***s’ – has been welcomed into the fold.

The move, set out in a motion tabled for the party’s ruling National Executive Committee (NEC) this week, will be seen as a direct challenge to Sir Keir’s ambition to draw a line under the Corbyn era.

Only last week, Sir Keir hailed Mr Wakeford’s defection by boasting it showed ‘Labour has changed’ and how it was now ‘my Labour party’.

But the move sparked fury from Labour’s Left that the former leader is still forced to sit as an independent MP more than a year after he was thrown out of the party following a bitter row over antisemitism. He will also not be allowed to stand as a Labour candidate in the next General Election.

But in a motion for Labour’s NEC meeting this week, Fire Brigades Union president Ian Murray brands the ban a ‘deeply divisive act by the leadership of the party’ which was ‘moving us further from the unity required’ to take on the Tories.

He also claims maintaining the ban, imposed in October 2020, was ‘extremely disrespectful’ to voters in Mr Corbyn’s Islington North seat, which he first won in 1983. Mr Murray told The Mail on Sunday: ‘We have just seen a Right-wing Tory become a Labour MP while boasting he has not changed his political views. Meanwhile Jeremy Corbyn, a Labour MP for 37 years, remains unjustly suspended. This is an insult to every Labour Party member.’

Corbyn ally and ex-Labour party chairman Ian Lavery also said it was ‘astonishing... how an individual who has a visible anti-Labour track record, voted against free school meals for kids and called the Labour Party a bunch of c***s is accepted with open arms, and the former leader of the party, a man with an impeccable Labour history, remains an outcast without the whip.’

Leeds MP Richard Burgon, who served on Mr Corbyn’s Shadow Cabinet, tweeted: ‘You can’t say the Labour Party should be a broad church then not restore the whip to former leader Jeremy Corbyn.’

Another Corbyn supporter claimed that forcing the ex-leader to stand as an independent in Islington North would be a ‘PR disaster’ for Sir Keir at the next Election.

Mr Corbyn was stripped of the Labour whip after claiming antisemitism in the party had been ‘dramatically overstated for political reasons’ after an equalities watchdog slammed his handling of the issue.

However, it was unclear last night if the ‘restore the whip’ motion would be put to a vote at the NEC amid claims that Corbyn allies did not want to risk a defeat by Starmer’s supporters on the committee. The Corbyn camp even suggested that withdrawing the motion might encourage a compromise that would allow him back into the fold.

But last night, Sir Keir’s allies appeared in no mood to negotiate – insisting Corbyn was still refusing to give a proper apology for his remarks on antisemitism, but would regain the party whip if he did.

A Labour spokesman said: ‘It’s been made very clear to Jeremy Corbyn what he must do to move this forward. That hasn’t changed, it’s in his hands.’

Bury MP Mr Wakeford used the four-letter word against Labour last year after it opposed cuts to Universal Credit.

Mr Corbyn was approached for comment but did not respond.