Jeremy and co? ‘They’re not up to the f****** job’
...even potty-mouth Prezza’s got it in for leader
JOHN Prescott has delivered a damning verdict on Jeremy Corbyn and his team, declaring: ‘They are just not up to the f****** job.’
The former Deputy Prime Minister made the comments after an angry confrontation at Westminster between moderate Labour MP Peter Kyle and Corbyn’s main ally, Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell.
Sources said the pair clashed over Mr McDonnell’s claim that anti-Corbyn MPs had attempted a so-called ‘soft coup’ against the leader – in effect, a whispering campaign rather than an open assault.
As Lord Prescott passed Mr Kyle in the corridor following the Commons meeting, witnesses claim he vented his frustration, saying: ‘They are just not up to the f****** job. They’ve always been useless and now they’re running things.’ He is then said to have rolled his eyes in dismay, adding: ‘F****** hell.’
The incident happened on Monday as MPs and peers left a meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party. Embarrassingly, it comes after Lord Prescott’s son David was recruited as a speechwriter last year for Mr Corbyn.
Until recently, Lord Prescott has defended the party leadership, and has urged MPs to rally around them. However, 24 hours before his comments to Mr Kyle, Lord Prescott wrote in a newspaper that Labour was ‘finished’ if it didn’t get its act together ‘from the leader to every MP’.
If the party’s decline under Corbyn continued, ‘the chance of Labour returning to government is impossible,’ he conceded.
Mr Kyle has been targeted for de-selection in his Hove seat by activists in the pro-Corbyn Momentum group.
He has angered Left-wingers by refusing to back a wealth tax and a motion to scrap union curbs. His local party was suspended by after claims of a Left-wing coup to sack the MP.
Lord Prescott last night denied making the remarks. Mr Kyle was unavailable for comment.