Dearlove pleased to see back of Corbyn

A former head of MI6 has said he is “certainly pleased that Corbyn is gone”, as he welcomed Sir Keir Starmer’s election as Labour leader.

During the 2019 general election campaign, Sir Richard Dearlove said then party leader Jeremy Corbyn represented a “present danger to our country”.

Speaking on the BBC’S The Andrew Marr Show yesterday, Sir Richard said: “I’m certainly pleased that Corbyn is gone.

“I think my strong personal views about Corbyn as a potential prime minister are well known and well understood.

“It’s a relief that he’s no longer leader of the Labour Party.

“On Keir Starmer, he seems to me to be a Labour leader of the type that we would expect and personally I feel quite content and happy with the fact that he’s now leading the Labour Party.

“I may not support him politically but I don’t see a repetition of the sort of problems that we had with Jeremy Corbyn – in fact not at all.”

Meanwhile Labour frontbencher Rachel Reeves told the same programme the party has joined a boycott of Facebook advertising over the social media giant’s alleged lack of action in tackling hate speech.