CORBYN’S SHALLOW CABINET
A shadow chancellor who hates capitalism, a vegan given the farming brief and an education spokesman who hadn’t met him
CHAOS surrounded Jeremy Corbyn’s appointment of his shadow cabinet yesterday, as Labour’s new leader desperately tried to find MPs prepared to work with him. In a move which s t unned t he agriculture industry, he named vegan Kerry McCarthy – who has branded animal farming as ‘dirty and cruel’ – as shadow environment, food and rural affairs secretary.
as a succession of Mps declined to join his team, Mr Corbyn was forced to appoint Lucy powell to the education brief – despite her admission last month that she had never met him.
also, Mr Corbyn’s new shadow chancellor, John McDonnell, wrote a hard-Left manifesto three years ago in which he demands an additional ‘wealth tax’ on the richest 10 per cent and a levy on land values in order to fund his dream socialist state.
Yesterday, humiliating details were revealed about how the Corbyn team spent Sunday
night frantically ringing Labour MPs and trying to persuade them – often unsuccessfully – to join his frontbench team.
Mr Corbyn was forced to create a senior role for Angela Eagle – as ‘ shadow first minister of state’ only after being warned by an aide that he was being pilloried for appointing only men to the top jobs. In a chaotic day for Labour:
Mr Corbyn was greeted by silence from his own MPs when he made his first postelection appearance in the Commons.
New Foreign Secretary Hilary Benn refused to endorse the appointment of Mr McDonnell as shadow chancellor.
Mr Corbyn’s decision to take his place on the Queen’s Privy Council, despite being a l i felong republican who has expressed sympathy for terror groups, raised fears in security circles.
The new Labour chief stunned his MPs by suggesting he may wear a white ‘peace’ poppy to the Cenotaph this year
Downing Street last night confirmed the Privy Council role would allow the Labour leader access to classified security briefings on terror threats and the fight against Islamic State. This will alarm critics concerned about his sympathies with Palestinian terrorists and the IRA, and his enthusiasm for the Putin regime in Moscow, which yesterday congratulated him.
David Cameron last night branded the Labour leader ‘a threat to our national security’, while former Tory party chairman Lord Tebbit said: ‘The sympathy he has shown for terrorists from the IRA to IS shows he’s not a man who can be trusted with matters relating to state security and the safety of the realm.’
The Prime Minister’s official spokesman said: ‘The Prime Minister has ensured that the leader of the opposition is briefed on national security issues as appropriate and will continue to do that. It will be driven on an issue by issue basis, as in the past.’
Mr Corbyn, a senior figure in CND and the Stop the War coalition, has spent decades pursuing far-Left causes and has adopted virulently anti-American stances on a range of issues. He has described Palestinian terror groups Hamas and Hezbollah as ‘friends’ and observed a minute’s silence for IRA terrorists shot by the SAS.
Mr Corbyn also supported Russia over its invasion of Ukraine and accused Nato of provoking Moscow by pursuing an expansionist agenda. He has even called for Nato to be ‘disbanded’.
His appointment to the Privy Council means Mr Corbyn will be forced to swallow his republican principles at a swearing in ceremony at which he will have to kneel before the Queen and kiss her hand.
Initially he indicated he would refuse the honour, but backed down after being warned he would not be able to fulfil all aspects of the opposition leader’s role if he refused. His appointment will be formalised at a ceremony in the coming weeks.
In 1994, lifelong republican Mr Corbyn demanded a referendum on scrapping the monarchy, saying: ‘It should be in our next manifesto, it would be very popular.’
In 1996, he clashed with the Commons Speaker after demanding a debate on ‘the future of the monarchy in this country’.
Mr Corbyn refused to answer questions on the issue during the Labour leadership race. But a source close to his campaign suggested last month that he remained a ‘staunch republican’ who was not interested in joining the Privy Council.
‘I don’t think it is Jeremy’s sort of thing, becoming a Privy Counsellor,’ the source said. ‘It is something that he feels very strongly about. He disagrees with the power, money, inheritance – all the staunch republican views.’
In a further retreat, it emerged that Mr Corbyn has started using the chauffeurdriven Jaguar provided to the leader of the opposition.
The politician, who does not own a car and usually travels by bicycle, had suggested he might refuse this, in keeping with his man of the people image.
But Labour sources yesterday confirmed he had started to use the limousine to get between appointments in his newlycrowded diary.