Labour’s new normal has finally pushed moderate MPS to their limit

The patience of Labour’s moderate MPS has finally been tested beyond endurance. After three years of increasingly provocative anti-semitic tropes and comments from Jeremy Corbyn’s followers, a speech by the man himself could persuade them to make the longanticipated final break with the party.

Corbyn’s comments that British Zionists, “having lived in this country for a very long time, probably all their lives… don’t understand English irony” (made in 2013 but only coming to light this week) would, in any normal, functional party, lead to the immediate resignation of the leader. But in Labour, this is the new normal.

For three years, moderates have tolerated mockery and abuse from Corbyn’s far-left supporters, as well as an unprecedented level of antisemitism – a disease that until recently was confined to the extreme Leftist outfits of the political fringes, but which has come to find itself comfortable in the Labour Party since Corbyn’s elevation to the leadership.

Yet there has been little appetite among the moderates to follow the example of those Labour MPS who, in 1981, deserted the party to form the Social Democratic Party. Until now.

If these latest revelations about Corbyn do not directly bring about an immediate split in Labour, then they will, at the very least, persuade several moderates that a breakaway centrist movement is now inevitable, even if it doesn’t happen overnight. While some MPS had already resigned themselves to their chosen exit route, there are others whose determination to stay has been progressively weakened by the summer’s stream of revelations, and for whom this latest controversy is decisive. After this week, it’s no longer a matter of “if ”, but “when”. One anti-corbyn Labour MP told me that the split will happen, and next spring has been pencilled in. “Our priority is fighting Brexit, but after that, there will be a split,” they said. There was no satisfaction in the tone, just resigned, bitter sadness.

There are two milestones that will prove crucial. The first is the UK’S departure from the EU in March next year. Moderates, almost entirely Remain supporters, want to prioritise the fight against Brexit over their quarrel with Corbyn for now. The second is the selection of candidates to fight the next general election.

The publication of new constituency boundaries next month will concentrate the minds of those hoping to survive the cull by Corbyn’s activist base. If moderates wait until after they have been replaced by hard-left true believers, their departure from the Labour tribe will be seen by the electorate as less about principle than about opportunism.

The window for action is therefore perilously narrow.