Corbyn tells PM ‘to go’ on election tour of Tyneside
CROWDS DEFY A DOWNPOUR TO SHOW SUPPORT
LABOUR leader Jeremy Corbyn visited the party’s North East heartlands yesterday as the general election race neared the finish line.
Over the course of the day he visited Consett in County Durham, Blyth in Northumberland and finally Gateshead where thousands braved pouring rain.
It was an impressive show of support. And, having seen the Tory lead over Labour shrink from 24 to just a single point in one poll over the course of the campaign, Mr Corbyn got one of his loudest cheers when he called: “They wrote us off, didn’t they?”
He began his tour at Derwentside College in Consett at lunch time where he launched his party’s ‘New Deal On Housing’ policy alongside shadow secretary for housing John Healey and met building apprentices.
They said their plan was for a target of 250,000 new homes being built a year by 2022, then sustained each year after that for the following five year Parliament.
Mr Healey also outlined a plans for what he described as 100,000 “genuinely affordable” homes to rent and buy a year by the final year of the next Parliament.
Mr Corbyn added: “Housing is a priority it hasn’t been since the decades following the Second World War. That’s what we need, it’s what people deserve and is what we’ll given them after Thursday’s election.”
He told the students: “All you are studying here today - bricklaying, carpentry and joinery all the skills connected to housebuilding, you are the future.”
Mr Corbyn also outlined a New Deal on homelessness with a mission to end rough sleeping within the next Parliament and tackle the root causes of it.
“The first person to react to the Manchester bombing was a homeless man who wanted to contribute,” he told the audience. Whilst there he took time out to address the row surrounding calls made by Steve Hilton, former Prime Minister David Cameron’s political ‘guru’ for Theresa May to resign. Mr Corbyn at first backed the calls then later clarified them, stressing it was a matter for the electorate to decide whether to oust Mrs May. He said: “I’m not backing away from anything, what I’m saying is there’s an election on now there’s a choice before everybody. “I’m articulating what is a deep anger amongst those people that have seen 20,000 police officers lose their jobs, seen firefighters lose their jobs, seen ambulance crews unable to cope.
“(Mrs May) needs to think about what she did while she was home secretary.”
He said the Northumbria and Durham police force areas had lost a quarter of their officers from 2010 to 2016 while Mrs May was Home Secretary.
In Northumbria, the figure fell 924 from 4,187 to 3,263. In Durham it fell 382 from 1,507 to 1,125, an overall total of 1,306.
Mr Corbyn’s visit over ran as he stopped to chat with students before heading off to Blyth for an open air rally.
Again despite pouring rain a large expectant crowd of several hundred gathered.
Amongst them were local Labour candidate for the Blyth Valley Constituency, Ronnie Campbell.
He described Mr Campbell, who has recently undergone treatment for stomach cancer, testament to the work of the NHS.
Also joining him at Blyth were Northumbria police and crime commissioner Vera Baird and Dave Anderson, who will not be contesting Blaydon at the forthcoming general election.
“You can say the general election 2017 hasn’t offered a stark choice in ideas on how the country should be run,” Mr Corbyn told the crowd.