Labour needs to become an effective opposition

Corbyn’s increased mandate means his rivals have to learn to work with him or risk harming party’s fortunes

Britain needs an effective opposition to hold the governing Conservatives to account as they plunge into the unknown problems of leaving the European Union with very little preparation for the huge challenges facing them. It should be easy for an opposition to get some traction against the Prime Minister’s mantra of refusing to tell anyone what Brexit means but this has not happened as the Labour Party has gone through yet another bout of self-destruction.

Labour has ended up badly damaged by the failed leadership challenge initiated by its centrist members of parliament who thought that if they could not beat their new leader Jeremy Corbyn, they at least hoped to derail his triumphalism on winning the leadership against the will of the vast majority of the members of parliament. The outcome was precisely the opposite. Corbyn has not just won the vote, he won by a larger margin than last year, and he won all three segments of the electorate and he won with a much higher turnout of Labour members.

There may be some hope of Labour finding a better way forward in the unusual statesmanship of Corbyn’s victory speech on Saturday in that he eschewed raw triumphalism, and instead reached out to all Labour members and sought to renew the party’s unity. It may be that some of the prominent anti-Corbyn MPs will listen to the substantial voice of their party membership and rejoin the shadow cabinet. But it is unlikely that they will be genuine about finding any positive impact of Corbyn’s Momentum movement on Labour, condemning their party to years of unease, if not civil strife.