UK Labour leader delivers speech of two halves to faithful
Jeremy Corbyn, the left-wing Labour MP who could one day be Britain’s prime minister, wrapped up his party’s annual conference in the southern English seaside town of Brighton yesterday with a speech of two halves.
For the first half of the 75-minute address, preceded by scenes of adulation when Mr Corbyn was cheered to the podium, he provided the audience with the type of barnstormer at which he excelled during this year’s general election campaign.
Mr Corbyn flayed his Conservative counterpart, prime minister Theresa May, for her decision to hold a general election that resulted in her party losing its majority in parliament.
He told jokes that were genuinely funny, turning slogans from the general election campaign that had been used against him by Conservative opponents into barbs against them.
A part of his speech attacking the media led to pantomime boos and applause as he singled out the right-wing Daily Mail’s negative coverage of his party – begging for worse at elections because it had helped so much the first time.
But when the populist gave way to his tendency to expound on policy, the leader’s speech lost its way.
On Brexit, where he could have seized the initiative with a surprise plan, he repeated platitudes as meaningless as those from Mrs May in a speech in Florence last week.
And Mr Corbyn’s delivery, which had been so passionate for 40 minutes, became laboured as he stumbled through the hour mark.
But he picked up for the speech’s conclusion and was rewarded with a standing ovation that lasted two and a half minutes.
Despite the enthusiasm, it was a case of “job done” in the conference hall.
The speech over, Mr Corbyn now awaits the British electorate’s verdict.