CORYBN COST US Ex-Labour MPs blame crushing election defeat on leader
well-off people.
“The real question we have to ask ourselves now is do we want the Tories, do we want to give them another five years or another 15 years, because if we get this wrong now as a party, this could very well be the end of the Labour movement,” she said.
Another ex-Labour MP, Anna Turley, who lost her seat in Redcar in the north east, described Mr Corbyn’s leadership as “a fundamental barrier that we just couldn’t get across”.
She said: “For me, when you’re getting four doors in a row of lifelong Labour voters saying ‘I’m sorry Anna,
I’m a lifelong Labour voter, I like what you’ve done, but I just can’t vote for that man to be prime minister’, I’m afraid that’s a fundamental barrier that we just couldn’t get across.”
Ms Turley also said Mr Corbyn was “absolutely” more of a reason than Brexit for her constituents choosing to vote for another party, adding: “In my constituency, even though it was a 67% Leave constituency, it was four to one the leadership over Brexit.”
She added that previously Labour voters on the doorsteps “didn’t trust him to put our country first” due to “his history and his baggage around security and terrorism”.
However, Mr McDonnell has insisted Mr Corbyn “was the right leader”, adding: “We could have won in 2017.
“Things moved on. Brexit dominated everything.
“I think there is an issue to be discussed about how the use of the social media – but also the overall media – has turned someone who I think is one of the most principled, honest, sincere, committed anti-racist politicians demonised by a smear campaign against him.
“My fear is that we are in for the long haul now, possibly five years.”
Labour MP for York Central Rachel Maskell – who retained her seat and has long been a supporter of Mr Corbyn – added that it is not just Labour’s leader who should take responsibility for the party’s defeat.
She said: “We’ve all got to take responsibility but I don’t think apportioning blame to a complex situation in a simplistic way is really the way to approach this, we’ve got to understand what is really happening ing across our political system.”