Jeremy corbyn

Jeremy Corbyn began the 2017 election campaign 20 points behind the Conservatives in the polls; he ended it just two per cent behind in the actual vote. The remarkable turnaround has been attributed by many to his effective use of social media, which allowed him to broadcast his message to people whom traditional campaigning fails to reach, people who in some cases may never have voted before. Social media is one aspect of how technology is changing politics – an issue debated at a recent Spectator lunch, in association with Michael Tobin OBE and involving a notable collection of people from the worlds of politics and technology. Do the unexpected results in recent elections really come down to who has the most effective online operation?

The case of Jeremy Corbyn and the Czechoslovakian diplomat has taken another turn today. The officer who met Corbyn has alleged that Corbyn took money from them and was a paid informant. The Labour leader’s office has vigorously denied the charge, citing the director of the Czech security force archive who has said that their records don’t back up this version of events. There’s clearly a contradiction between the accounts of Corbyn and the Czechoslovakian diplomat—and the Labour leader is entitled to the presumption of innocence on this point. Corbyn, though, would undoubtedly be the most anti-Western figure ever to become Britain’s Prime Minister.

Most of the time I feel perfectly at ease in my own country, and that would be the case had we voted Brexit or Remain, Theresa May or Jeremy Corbyn. But just occasionally Britain seems to me an utterly alien place – bizarre even. Today, Jeremy Corbyn launched his manifesto for pets. He wants to ban foie gras, make it mandatory for motorists to report that they have run over and killed cats, and pass a law giving tenants the right to keep a pet. I don’t suspect that he will encounter a great deal of opposition on these things – bar a token protest on the last from buy-to-let investors. Fox hunting aside, no political party in recent times has come to much harm by doing something to help furry, feathery or scaly animals.

The Conservatives are currently in such disagreement over what the government approach to the second round of Brexit negotiations should be that the vote on the final deal seems a long way off indeed. However, it's clearly on the mind of the Opposition. At a Resolution Foundation panel event this morning, Len McCluskey – the leader of Unite and top Corbyn ally – said he hoped Labour MPs voted down any Brexit deal the Tories come back with: 'My personal hope and belief is that in late Autumn of this year the [Brexit] deal that comes back to parliament will be rejected, Theresa May will resign, and it will lead to an early general election in 2019.

If any further evidence was needed about the disingenuousness of Jeremy Corbyn and the dangers a government led by him might pose internationally – not just for Britain but also for Britain’s Nato allies – it is worth watching Corbyn’s interview on Iran with the BBC’s Andrew Marr yesterday. ‘You've been very reluctant to condemn the government of Iran. Can I read you what Amnesty International has said about Iran… ?’ began Marr yesterday, to which Corbyn interrupted him with the extraordinary response: ‘I think that actually, if I may say so, you're spending too much time reading the Daily Mail, do you know that?

It's happened. Jeremy Corbyn has finally broken his silence on Iran. To be fair, he was rather forced into doing so when Andrew Marr raised the topic live on air this morning. Marr put to the Labour leader – who says ‘to stay neutral in times of injustice is to side with the oppressor’ – that he had gone rather quiet on Iran after over 20 people died and more gone missing following clashes between protesters and security forces.   https://twitter.com/BBCNews/status/957555007414444033 Corbyn started of by saying Marr had been reading the Daily Mail too often. “I did some programmes for Press TV”  he said. “I ceased to do any programmes when they treated the Green Movement the way that they did.” This is flatly untrue.

Although Chris Williamson recently exited the Labour frontbench – by mutual agreement – the loyal Corbynista has vowed to do what he can for Jeremy Corbyn from the back bench. And this he did on Question Time on Thursday when he joining David Dimbleby for the weekly current affairs show. Speaking on a panel comprised of Michael Forsyth, Fiona Hyslop MSP, Maggie Chapman and Peter Oborne, Williamson did his best to fly the flag for the Labour leader. Only he soon ran into a spot of bother when an audience asked him why if the Labour party was so big and great, Jeremy Corbyn was the best they could come up with: AM: If your party is so big and so powerful and coming forward, how come the best you have got to offer is Jeremy Corbyn?

Hard left, my arse. Sorry to be vulgar, but surely that’s how Jim Royle, couch-potato patriarch of that glorious sitcom The Royle Family, would have reacted to reports that the ‘hard left’ Momentum movement is planning a ‘massacre of the moderates’ in the parliamentary Labour party. Don’t get me wrong. Having seized control of Labour’s National Executive Committee, Momentum is itching to purge the party’s benches of MPs who are insufficiently obsequious to Jeremy Corbyn. But calling this fragile political sect ‘hard’ left is silly. ‘Far’ left, perhaps — but let’s not confuse Momentum activists with the powerful Marxist bruisers of 40 years ago.

For Jeremy Corbyn and his allies, there has been no far-left takeover of the Labour party or its governing National Executive Committee. It’s true that, this week, Corbyn supporters came to control the majority of the NEC, completing their command of the party apparatus. But they see this as getting rid of the last of the right-wingers and enabling — for the first time — the Labour party to dedicate itself to the interests of the working class. It’s not the triumph of a fringe, they say, but the expulsion of a fringe. The Corbynite agenda of government expansion, mass nationalisation of railways, utilities and more, can now be pursued. Those still laughing at all that have not been paying attention.

The Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon was given the prime interview slot on the Andrew Marr Show this morning. Noting the change in SNP rhetoric since before the 2017 election, Marr pushed Sturgeon for a timeframe as to when Scottish voters could expect to see a second independence referendum: https://youtu.be/LjgwDqJgqy4 NS: There is a lot of confusion, this is a complex issue... and people want to see the clarity emerge about the state of the relationship between the UK and the EU. At that point, what I've said is that we will look at that and determine at that stage if Scotland should then have the right to choose between whatever that new relationship with the UK is going to be or choosing to be an independent country.

After Theresa May's underwhelming and chaotic Cabinet reshuffle on Monday and Tuesday, Jeremy Corbyn has followed suit and carried out a minor reshuffle of his front bench. With loyal Corbynista Chris Williamson resigning from the shadow cabinet on Thursday following his call to double council tax for large properties, there was speculation that the Leader's Office were keen to distance themselves from firebrand MPs as they get serious about winning power. However, the list of new appointments suggests that this is not the case. Laura Pidcock has been appointed as shadow minister for Labour.

Gerard Coyne’s campaign team will reform in Birmingham this week, as the whisper spreads that control of Unite, Britain’s biggest union, and a sizeable share of influence in the Labour party, is up for grabs. By rights, Coyne should no longer have a 'team' or a career. Last year’s election for the general secretary of Unite saw the far left and union bureaucracy use Putinesque tactics to ensure their victory. They marked their success by firing Coyne from his job as Unite's West Midlands regional secretary. He had had the bad manners to challenge Len McCluskey in a 'free' election. Clearly, such impertinence could not go unpunished. Perhaps nothing will change.