A Unionist? No, I’m a Socialist, says Corbyn
Labour leader flip-flops THREE times over his Indyref stance
JEREMY Corbyn yesterday admitted he is not a Unionist as he shifted his position on a Scexit referendum for the third time in 24 hours.
The Labour leader was asked directly if he was a Unionist and replied: ‘No, I’m a Socialist.’
It came after he revealed he would only rule out another independence referendum taking place in the first two years of a Labour government.
The latest disarray came on the second day of Mr Corbyn’s tour of Scottish constituencies. His comments suggest that if he gets into No 10 he could grant the SNP another vote on breaking up Britain any time from late 2021.
He initially said on Wednesday morning that he would not allow a referendum in the first term of a Labour government, before later clarifying that he would only rule it out in his ‘early years’ in power, then changing this yesterday to the first ‘two years’.
Mr Corbyn’s unclear position has angered many in Scottish Labour.
Scottish Tory leader Jackson Carlaw said: ‘Given how his position on a second independence referendum has weakened every time he has come to Scotland, pro-UK supporters here will be glad Mr Corbyn isn’t staying another day. Nobody now can have the slightest shred of doubt – Mr Corbyn is a clear and present danger to the most successful political union in history. He must be stopped – and only a vote for the Scottish Conservatives will do that.’
Mr Corbyn, who was campaigning in Dundee yesterday, was asked in a TV interview if the 2021 Holyrood election result could play a part in whether to hold a referendum. He said he would ‘certainly not’ support one ‘in the first two years of the government’.
In a later interview, with STV News, he said: ‘What we are saying is we would not agree to it at all in the early years of an incoming Labour government.’
Pressed on what the early years are, he said: ‘Well, let’s go down a few years and say we’ll look at it.’
Asked if he would consider himself a Unionist, he said: ‘No, I would consider myself a socialist.’
One Labour politician said: ‘Yesterday was like taking one step forward and then two steps back.’
Another party source said Scottish Labour candidates are ‘just trying to get their heads down and work seats locally’. A Labour candidate also told the BBC that the mixed message on an independence referendum was a ‘bloody disaster’.
Former Labour cabinet minister Douglas Alexander told BBC Scotland: ‘The position that seemed to be clarified yesterday was that there will not be a second independence referendum in the early years of a Labour government.
‘But I think Labour’s position should be where the majority of us are as Scots, which is that we want to remain within the United Kingdom, and we want the United Kingdom to remain within the European Union – we feel Scottish, British and European. But what we have seen, to put it kindly, is that ambiguity has not been a friend to the Labour Party since the referendum in 2014 or indeed since the Brexit referendum in 2016.’
John McTernan, former political secretary to Tony Blair, said Scottish Labour leader Richard Leonard considered the referendum issue a ‘distraction’.
Scottish Liberal Democrat campaign chairman Alex Cole-Hamilton said: ‘If you are pro-UK and pro-EU, you can no longer rely on the Labour Party to represent you on either count.’