Jeremy corbyn

Throughout Jeremy Corbyn's leadership of the Labour party, his links to Sinn Féin have been called into question by his critics. As Mr S's colleague Douglas Murray has previously reported, Corbyn was chumming up to the Irish republican party even while their military wing was blowing up ordinary pub-goers, shooting farmers in the head and planting bombs in Britain’s shopping centres. So while times have changed, Mr S was curious to learn of a fringe event taking place at Labour conference in Liverpool. Steerpike understands that Sinn Féin will host a talk titled 'Brexit: the cost of Ireland's Partition'.

Running through the summer like the writing in a stick of rock was the continually disappointing and dismal performance of Owen Smith in the Labour leadership contest, and Jeremy Corbyn’s spectacular ability to make party members love him more by confecting his own rows about trains and women going out for drinks. The post-match analysis in the Labour moderate camp has already begun, with few bothering to make any greater defence of the Smith campaign than ‘it might be a bit closer than the polls suggest’.

Could Jeremy Corbyn come out of the Labour leadership contest with an even bigger mandate? Few would be surprised and a new poll on the front page of the Times today suggests that such an outcome is highly likely. The YouGov survey indicates Corbyn is beating his rival Owen Smith by 62 per cent to 38 per cent amongst Labour voters - a result which would gift him a three per cent spike on last year's vote, when he won 59.5 per cent. This would spell disaster for those challenging Corbyn and make it almost certain that the Labour leader would still be in place come a 2020 general election.

Owen Smith desperately needs to make up ground in Labour's leadership contest (bookies’ odds, perhaps more reliable than the polls, suggest Corbyn has an 84 per cent chance of winning next month). What's more, with voting soon drawing to a close, he has less and less time to do so. Which all explains why last night's leadership hustings in Glasgow was much more bitter than any of the others which came before it. The main topic of contention yesterday? The referendum - something which Smith is trying eagerly to make his own cause and his reason for being. Earlier this week, he said he wanted to block Brexit - a strategy which perhaps wasn't as fruitful as he hoped it would be.

On Wednesday, Jeremy Corbyn appeared rather rattled when a Sky News reporter asked him about 'traingate' at a campaign event on the NHS. The Labour leader huffed and puffed before explaining that while there were a few empty seats on the train he had wanted to sit next to his wife. Unfortunately, this remark contradicted a briefing from Corbyn's own team the night before, with his representatives claiming that the issue was not just that he couldn't find two unreserved seats next to each other. So, why was there a communications breakdown? There appears to be a clue in today's Guardian. It seems that after Virgin released the CCTV footage, Corbyn's team were unable to reach him. Why?

This morning Jeremy Corbyn has woken up to find his face plastered across the front pages of the Daily Mail and the Times following 'traingate'. After Corbyn appeared in a video calling for the railways to be re-nationalised while sitting on the floor of a 'ram-packed' Virgin train, the company hit back. On Tuesday, Richard Branson's team released a press release and CCTV footage which appears to show that Corbyn did have a seat after all. As the media feasted on the footage yesterday, Corbyn's team first dismissed the claims as a 'lie' before offering an alternative account several hours later. Now with the spin machine firmly back in action, the Labour leader's campaign manager appeared on Today for an exercise in damage limitation.

As the internet goes into meltdown over the news that Jeremy Corbyn may have had a seat after all when he filmed a video claiming he did not, it appears that the Labour leader hasn't done much to help his cause. While his campaign team claim that Virgin Train's CCTV footage is a 'lie', Corbyn can at least take heart that the cameras appear to have been working.

After Sadiq Khan declared that he would not get involved in the Labour leadership contest, the Mayor of London had a change of heart over the weekend and penned a piece for the Observer endorsing Owen Smith. Corbyn's supporters have not taken this well -- even re-circulating Mr S's story about Khan attending Rupert Murdoch's summer drinks party to suggest that he is a wrong'un. Meanwhile at a pro-Corbyn rally in London last night, thousands of supporters took things up a gear as they let their new-found feelings on the Muslim son of a bus driver be known. Despite Khan's recent election as mayor, attendees started booing at the very mention of his name: https://twitter.com/georgeeaton/status/767443058682101760 https://twitter.

Sadiq Khan’s endorsement of Owen Smith is rather handy for the ailing Labour leadership contender, given Khan is one of the few Labour politicians who has actually won something: that something being the largest personal mandate of any politician. This enormous mandate is rather handy when Jeremy Corbyn starts waving his own huge mandate about, but it may not be attractive enough for Labour members, who largely seem besotted by the idea of Corbyn as leader.

It's tough being a part of the Labour coup. Even though you've plotted behind the party leader's back and are now supporting a challenger, it's important to remain on civil terms. That must be why Jack Dromey cut an interview short about the need to replace Jeremy Corbyn to... greet Jeremy Corbyn. https://twitter.com/Alison1mackITV/status/766330487854010369 The smiling pair enjoyed a friendly chat, with Corbyn welcoming Dromey with open arms. Mr S suspects the Corbynistas may have a point when it comes to today's politicians lacking integrity.

With Labour's list of all-male mayoral candidates announced last week, there has been some speculation that the potential loss of Andy Burnham to Manchester and Steve Rotheram to Liverpool will spell disaster for the Commons football team. While this of course hinges on both MPs being successful in their efforts, Mr S understands that should victory beckon Corbyn will have a far more pressing matter on his hands. As well as losing the shadow Home Secretary, the Labour leader would have to go without the man who preps him for PMQs.

Victoria Derbyshire seemed very anxious as Labour’s two-hour-long hustings between Owen Smith and Jeremy Corbyn wore on this morning to move the debate away from the many internal messes that the party is in (Jewish members not feeling safe any more, online abuse, the chasm between the PLP and the membership: you name it, they covered it) and onto policy. At first, it wasn’t entirely clear why the programme’s producers had been so worried about covering policy: there is barely a cigarette paper between Corbyn and Smith, and that’s exactly how the challenging candidate wants it. The only big points of disagreement are on Trident renewal and the odd £0.5bn of spending pledges for building this and that.

Another honours list comes and goes and yet again my name is not on it. I don’t think either the Prime Minister or Jeremy Corbyn realises the hurt that this flagrant oversight engenders, both in myself and of course in my public. For countless years I have tried, selflessly, to make the world a better place, to illuminate the poor and the downtrodden with the light of love. I have endeavoured, wherever I can, in my own way, to bring comfort to the sick — not only those who are physically infirm, but also mentals. And yet — nothing, nix. More pertinently, with regard to the latest honours list from David Cameron, I was at a party at the end of last year and offered Sam Cam a fag.