Corbyn’s ‘futile’ bid to block no-deal
FAILED Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn will attempt to derail Boris Johnson’s post-Brexit trade plans in his final days in the job.
He will try to amend key laws to block a no-deal exit at the end of the year when the transition period ends.
He wants to bind the UK to the EU for another two years unless a trade deal has been struck by June.
But the futile bid, one of his last acts as leader, is doomed to fail after Mr Corbyn led Labour to its worst election result in more than 80 years. Meanwhile polling puts Sir Keir Starmer, who has yet to declare he is standing, as frontrunner to replace Mr Corbyn.
He told Sky News: “The most important thing is that the Labour Party is rebuilt, we learn the lessons of the last general election, reflect on them and don’t underestimate them. But we need the Labour Party as a trusted force for good.” The centrist shadow Brexit secretary would beat Corbynite Rebecca Long Bailey by 61 per cent to 39 in a run-off, says YouGov.
Professor Tim Bale of Queen Mary University of London, who jointly ran the poll with the University of Sussex, said: “It doesn’t look as if the winner will come from the Left.” Only shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry and shadow treasury minister Clive Lewis have declared.
WHAT joy there must be in Downing Street at the news that Keir Starmer has emerged as the frontrunner for the Labour leadership. If there is one thing even more guaranteed to ensure another Labour defeat in 2024 than a continuity Corbyn candidate, it is a dripping wet London liberal as their leader.
Has Labour learnt nothing from the loss of all those seats in its former heartlands in the Midlands and North? Over and over again, defeated candidates have reported, voters complained of how Labour had been taken over by the Remaincentred, woke brigade from London.Their communities had been left behind as Labour became obsessed with the sort of issues that light up an Islington salon.
True, it is possible to present Starmer as the “sensible” choice if you look only at tax and spend policies. I guess that a Starmer manifesto would stop short of offering £83billion of spending rises, all magically funded by the wealthiest five per cent of the population – many of whom would have fled the country had Labour been elected.
But on many other issues Starmer is just as divorced from the views of Labour’s lost voters. As well as doing all he could to frustrate Brexit, Starmer is the former Director of Public Prosecutions who presided over the Crown Prosecution Service when it made many perverse decisions.
UNDER his leadership, the CPS failed to prosecute the serial rapist John Worboys for 75 of his suspected crimes. He was convicted of attacks on 12 women in 2009 but the decision to limit prosecution to those cases led to him being recommended for early release.
It was Starmer’s CPS, too, that failed to prosecute Jimmy Savile in spite of evidence of his offending. Starmer defended the refusal to prosecute two doctors caught on tape appearing to offer women abortions based on the gender of their unborn child.
He said it wouldn’t be “in the public interest” – though some may disagree.
On the other hand, Starmer was reported to have intervened personally to insist on the prosecution of Paul Chambers, an airline passenger who foolishly sent a tweet jokingly suggesting he wanted to blow up Robin Hood airport, Doncaster, when his plane was delayed. Chambers deserved a thorough rap on the knuckles, but to jam up the courts when we can’t seem to find the resources to prosecute genuine terrorists, like the 400 British citizens who are believed to have returned to Britain after fighting with IS?
There is a very clear voice coming out of former mining and industrial communities, if only Labour is prepared to listen. There are many voters who lean a little leftwards economically but are socially conservative.
They want properly funded public services, public investment in their regions and private firms kept British, not sold off to asset-strippers who will suck jobs out of the country.
But they are also patriotic and believe in institutions such as marriage.
They are most certainly not soft on crime and terrorism.
LABOUR is hardly speaking to these people at all. On the contrary, Remain MPs like Keir Starmer can hardly conceal their contempt for a group they seem to consider to be too stupid to know what is good for them.
Corbyn’s Brexit policy may have been feeble and confused, but it is the likes of Starmer who did the real damage, by turning their backs on the party’s 2017 policy of carrying through Brexit and insisting that the manifesto contained the promise of a second referendum instead.
Labour’s leadership contest tells you all you need to know about the party’s attitude towards women.
When Corbyn first announced that he would step down, several potential female candidates emerged. Yet over the past couple of weeks they have been pushed aside.
A party which endlessly bleats about gender inequality can’t seem to cope with the idea of being led by a woman – 45 years after the Conservatives elected their first female leader.
True, the former frontrunner, Rebecca Long Bailey, would have been a disaster as the continuity Corbyn candidate, but what about Lisa Nandy or Jess Phillips – both of whom the Tories fear for their connection to Labour’s lost voters?
The truth is that Labour is miles away from its claim to be the champion of the underdog.
It has its own aristocracy which seeks to keep people in their place.
Keir Starmer is a prime example. If elected, he would take the party nowhere.
‘Has party learned nothing from loss of seats in the heartland?’