Jeremy Corbyn’s disastrous day:
Labour leader flustered on radio interview and then ducks out of Mumsnet webchat after 25 minutes
JEREMY CORBYN suffered his worst moment of the election campaign so far when he was stumped on live radio by a question about the cost of a child care policy he was trying to promote.
The Labour leader was hoping to woo female voters by appearing on Woman’s Hour on BBC Radio 4, but instead stumbled through the “car crash” interview unsure of his facts and ended up patronising the audience by implying childcare was the number one priority for women.
The presenter, Emma Barnett, was later bombarded with anti-semitic abuse from supporters of the Labour leader on Twitter. Barnett, who was brought up in an orthodox Jewish family, was subjected to messages on social media describing her as a “Zionist shill”. Mr Corbyn condemned the attacks on Barnett as “totally and completely unacceptable”, but the row will raise further questions about Labour’s perceived problem with anti-semitism.
Later in the day Mr Corbyn offended users of the Mumsnet website by cutting short an online web chat which users described as “a waste of time” and a “token effort”.
Mr Corbyn was poorly prepared for his interview with Barnett on Woman’s Hour, and was caught out by almost the first question, despite it being a straightforward inquiry about the cost of the policy he was promoting.
Asked how much it would cost to provide 30 hours of universal free childcare for children aged two to four, he said: “Erm, it will cost, erm. It will obviously cost a lot to do so, we accept that.”
He started fiddling with his ipad and flicking through the Labour manifesto looking for the figure, but over the course of the next three and a half minutes he was unable to provide a costing. He was finally given the figure by Barnett – £5.5 billion – and said “that does sound correct”. The independent think tank Localis later claimed the real cost was £7.5billion – not including capital investment to provide more space for the 1.3million children affected.
It drew inevitable comparisons with a radio interview earlier in the camclear paign in which Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary, got her maths wrong and suggested police officers would be paid just £30 per year.
At a campaign event later in the day, Mr Corbyn apologised that he “didn’t have the exact figure in front of me”.
Mr Corbyn was asked if he was still a vice-president of the Campaign for Nu- Disarmament, and replied: “I don’t think I’m the vice-president of CND.” He said he had resigned the position when he became Labour leader, but in fact he only took on the role after he became Labour leader.
Barnett asked him what would most benefit women in the Labour manifesto, and he replied: “Big investment in early years education.” A clearly unimpressed Barnett retorted: “So linking women to children, women as mothers.”
Mr Corbyn carried on his attempt to win over female voters with a web chat on Mumsnet, but arrived late and then left after only 25 minutes, having answered 11 questions. Mumsnet users said it was a “huge disappointment”.
Priti Patel, the International Development Secretary, said: “He has made Diane Abbott’s grasp of detail look impressive. This car crash interview shows Jeremy Corbyn isn’t up to the job of leading our country through the challenges ahead – he is simply too big a risk to take.”