The day that Corbyn told tuition fee protesters: **** the rich!
JEREMY Corbyn once told a political rally he wanted to ‘f*** the rich’, it was claimed last night.
The veteran socialist, who is the favourite to be elected Labour leader next week, is reported to have made the explosive remark only months after Tony Blair entered Downing Street.
The comments were reported in The Times in November 1997, and printed again by Newsweek magazine yesterday.
The MP, who has represented Islington North since 1983, was quoted as telling a rally against tuition fees in Hyde Park: ‘We have to
‘Address society’s
problems’
address the problems of society by redistributing wealth. He then added: ‘F*** the rich.’ A spokesman for Mr Corbyn did not deny he made the remarks, but said: ‘Jeremy’s politics are about creating a fairer, more just society. But as for the bad language, it’s simply not in Jeremy’s vocabulary.’
Mr Corbyn is widely expected to be crowned as the successor to Ed Miliband a week today, despite a last-minute rally by Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper.
Momentum has been building after Miss Cooper appeared to lead on the migrant crisis. She also made a passionate intervention in Thursday’s leadership hustings on Sky, attacking Mr Corbyn over his quantitative easing plans for the economy.
Bookmakers Ladbrokes cut her odds sharply this week while a new poll of Labour’s councillors showed Mr Corbyn’s lead was just one per- centage point. He received 30 per cent of councillors’ first-preference votes, closely followed by Miss Cooper on 29 per cent and Andy Burnham on 28 per cent. Liz Kendall trailed on 13 per cent.
Today a senior Labour MP will urge the party to get over its ‘Blair complex’ and move on.
Tristram Hunt, the shadow education secretary, urged the party not to split over the emergence of Mr Corbyn.
He said: ‘We have a Blair complex, we need to get over him and it. We cannot constantly define ourselves against a figure from our past.’
He said the last two Labour leadership contests with the elections of Gordon Brown and Mr Miliband had been about distancing the party from the Blair legacy.
Mr Hunt accused Mr Corbyn’s campaign of a using ‘more extreme narrative’ against Mr Blair.
He added: ‘Where does this stop? The public will be confused as to why a politician elected to the leadership more than 20 years ago continues to occupy the minds and dominate the thinking of today’s leadership ranks within the Labour Party.’ No matter what the result of the contest, the whole party must accept it, ‘stay loyal to Labour’ and rebuild the party as one of ‘government, not just a voice of protest’.
‘I have no patience with anyone muttering now about breakaways or legal challenges or changing the rules to keep people out. They are playing into the hands of the Tories,’ he added.
Mr Hunt suggested he would stay in the Shadow Cabinet even if Mr Corbyn was leader.
Ed Miliband is expected to remain on the backbenches when the new Labour leader is elected, it emerged last night. The former party leader is expected to rule out a return to front-line politics in the coming days. His decision will end speculation that he could return to a senior party role under Mr Corbyn.
A spokesman for Mr Miliband refused to comment on the reports, calling them ‘speculation’. Posh past of the Sexpot Trot – Pages 28 and 29