CORBYN IS CONDEMNED BY HIS OWN CANDIDATES
REVEALED: In their own savage words, Corbyn’s MP hopefuls on what they REALLY think about leader
‘Not fit to be leader or PM’
CALLUM ANDERSON, LABOUR CANDIDATE FOR S-W BEDFORDSHIRE
JEREMY CORBYN faced fresh humiliation last night as it emerged some of his own candidates have accused him of destroying Labour and leading the party to electoral annihilation.
A dozen would-be Labour MPs, including several Scots, savaged Mr Corbyn’s character and his chances of becoming PM. Some slammed his Brexit dithering while others blamed him for not driving anti-Semitism out of his party and for allowing hard-Left zealots to take control.
The embarrassing remarks were made in social media posts and articles – some made this year but most before they were selected to stand for the party in the December 12 election – uncovered by the Mail.
Among the most withering comments came from Labour’s candidate in the west Midlands seat of Kenilworth and Southam – 23-year-old Ant Tucker. Then at warwick University,
he wrote for student website Filibuster after two by-election defeats in 2017: ‘Yes, Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership is disastrously unpopular with the general public, regardless of what his most fervent supporters believe.’
And when Mr Corbyn was challenged for the Labour leadership by Owen Smith the previous year, Mr Tucker wrote: ‘We all must get behind him (Mr Smith) in order to save Labour from the monstrous regime of Corbyn and his cronies.’
All of the candidates’ extraordinary comments were still online as the deadline for nominations closed at 4pm yesterday and the hopefuls were confirmed as official Labour candidates in next month’s General Election. Some are standing in ultra-tight marginal seats across Great Britain and their success could be crucial in getting Mr Corbyn, 70, into Downing Street.
Last night senior Tories said it was clear that voters should not back Mr Corbyn when even his own candidates had passed such damning judgments on him.
It comes after two former Labour ministers said they would vote Conservative to keep Mr Corbyn out of power, while Labour’s campaign has been dogged by controversy over unsuitable candidates and costly policies.
Conservative Party chairman James Cleverly said: ‘When Labour’s own candidates are saying “Corbyn would be a disaster”, that tells you all you need to know about the prospect of Jeremy Corbyn in Downing Street.
‘Corbyn has proved time and again, in the words of another Labour candidate, that he is not fit to lead or be prime minister.
‘Corbyn would wreck our economy and waste the whole of next year on two chaotic referendums. Only the Conservatives will get Brexit done so we can move on and focus on investing in our NHS, our schools and putting 20,000 more police on the streets.’
Anti-Corbyn comments from wouldbe Labour MPs include:
1. PAVITAR MANN
The councillor running for Labour in Spelthorne, Surrey, criticised Mr Corbyn and his followers when he was fighting off a leadership challenge. Watching him debate rival Mr Smith in September 2016, she wrote on Twitter: ‘What a depressing state we’re in. Corbyn demonstrating his ineffective leadership. Yet the #cultofcorbyn still fawn.’
2. LEWIS WHYTE
In July this year, Mr Whyte, standing in Inverness, said he felt sick to his stomach after watching Panorama’s devastating expose of antiSemitism in Labour. ‘The reality is that Corbyn’s leadership has enabled an atmosphere where (antiSemites) feel safe, and have done nothing more than tokenism to deal with it,’ he tweeted.
3. MIKE STUBBS
The councillor standing for the party in Tory-held Stone, Staffordshire, has repeatedly urged Mr Corbyn to quit. During the 2016 leadership challenge, Mr Stubbs tweeted: ‘It’s time for Jeremy Corbyn to resign for the good of our country.’ When Mr Corbyn claimed his movement could change the country, Mr Stubbs hit back: ‘You’re exactly right, JC, just unfortunately for the worse.’ Mr Stubbs also criticised Mr Corbyn’s ‘painful delivery’ during Prime Minister’s Questions.
4. DUNCAN TOWNSON
In another closely contested seat – Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock – Labour contender Mr Townson has made a series of personal attacks on his party leader and his approach to Brexit. Mr Townson addressed Mr Corbyn directly on Twitter after Labour’s shock defeat in the 2017 Copeland by-election, asking: ‘Did last night finally wake you up from your one-man crusade to destroy Labour?’ In another message, the Classics graduate told the leader: ‘If you weren’t so caught up in your own personal agenda, you would see that capturing the next generation of voters was key.’ He also told him: ‘By supporting a hard Brexit, you and your self-righteousness have lost Labour the votes that matter in the future.’
5. ANT TUCKER
Mr Tucker warned in 2016: ‘We in Labour are faced with annihilation if we let Corbyn lead us into the next election, or allow the far-Left to tighten its grip on our party. Corbyn offers us nothing but failure.’
6. KATE WATSON
In the must-win constituency of Glasgow East, where the SNP has a majority of just 75, Labour candidate Miss Watson wrote in 2016: ‘I’m a Labour member and feel betrayed by Jeremy Corbyn destroying the party I love. Please do the honourable thing and resign.’ She was also scathing about Mr Corbyn’s avid supporters, claiming they were ‘backing his efforts to destroy the Labour Party’.
7. JOHN ERSKINE
Only six months ago, Labour’s candidate in the SNP-held constituency of Ross, Skye and Lochaber blamed Mr Corbyn and his ‘unforgivable’ Brexit stance for
Labour’s ‘awful’ European Parliament election results. Mr Erskine, once a Holyrood adviser, asked: ‘Where else can the blame lie? Corbyn’s record goes from bad to worse with these election results. It’s time to put the people of the country ahead of blind support for the leader.’
8. AZHAR ALI
During an online debate over who would make the best Labour leader in 2015, Mr Ali – now trying to win back marginal Pendle in Lancashire – tweeted succinctly: ‘Corbyn would be a disaster.’
9. ASHLEY DALTON
Council officer Miss Dalton, standing in Rochford and Southend East, where she cut the Tories’ majority in half at the last election, told a friend online in early 2017 that although their party was not quite dead, ‘Corbyn is like trying to heal organ failure with homeopathy. We need a transplant’.
Last week she was challenged on Twitter over her apparent lack of backing for Mr Corbyn. She admitted her favoured candidate had not won the leadership contest but added: ‘We have a bigger job to do. This country needs a Labour government not a Labour Party squabbling with itself.’ In South West
Bedfordshire, the newly selected Labour candidate opposed Mr Corbyn’s leadership bid and dismissed his chances of winning an election. Callum Anderson, a policy adviser who once worked for the EU, said: ‘Apart from those on the Left he has no appeal.’
During the 2016 leadership challenge, he said Mr Corbyn’s critical comments about Nato were ‘more evidence that Corbyn is not fit to be leader or PM’. In another discussion, he said: ‘A Tory landslide is highly likely.’
Labour’s candidate in Croydon South also hit out at Mr Corbyn last year for once saying Zionists living in this country ‘don’t understand English irony’. Olga FitzRoy, a recording engineer, tweeted: ‘Suggesting a group that includes many (majority) of Jewish people isn’t English has really nasty connotations.’
Asked about his comments last night, Mr Tucker said: ‘I’m proud to be Kenilworth and Southam’s Labour candidate. My campaign will represent the best of Labour’s traditions: inclusive, non-factional and, above all, ruthless in rooting out prejudice in our movement.’
The comments by new Labour candidates illustrate how Mr Corbyn has divided Labour. A backbench MP for more than 30 years, he suddenly rose to prominence and won the leadership by a landslide in 2015 thanks to an army of Left-wing supporters who paid £3 to join the party and vote for him.
His radical policies alienated moderate Labour MPs, however, and more than 40 quit his frontbench in as many hours in 2016, leading to a confidence vote that he lost. But he refused to quit and saw off challenges from Owen Smith and Angela Eagle to retain the leadership.
Mr Corbyn has remained in post despite the losing the 2017 General Election, although some moderate MPs have since quit the party to join the Liberal Democrats or the ill-fated Change UK group. A spokesman for Mr Corbyn declined to comment last night.