I supported Keir Starmer for the leadership, and would do so again. But this cannot go on.
You are browsing in private mode. To enjoy all the benefits of our website LOG IN or Create an Account Parts of the Labour left seem intent on insurrection against the leadership over Jeremy Corbyn’s suspension. Parts of the Labour right seem intent on using that insurrection to purge the left. Keir Starmer is marooned on an island of his own making, stuck between two factions at war with one another, with little chance of escape. Let’s start by saying the obvious: this is a bad position to be in. You don’t need to be a chess grandmaster to work out the potential endgames. Either Corbyn apologises for the breaches of equality law identified by the Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), and is given back the Labour whip. Or he wins a court case and is given back the whip. Or he remains excluded, provoking legitimate anger among a membership whose left-wing majority are trying to work with the leadership, but are being provoked into one confrontation after another. In all eventualities, since the independent disciplinary body proposed by the EHRC can deal with cases retrospectively, Corbyn and others may face yet another “due process” once it is set up. If so, whether that process constitutes double jeopardy will be decided in court, not by the Labour leadership or party HQ. In the meantime, one Constituency Labour Party (CLP) meeting after another is descending into acrimony, with walkouts and suspensions, as local branches refuse orders that ban discussion of Corbyn’s suspension. [See also: Is Keir Starmer a strategic mastermind or an opportunist driven by events?] I supported Starmer for the leadership, and would do so again, but this cannot go on. Starmer’s plans for dealing with the EHRC report were well laid. Calls were made to all stakeholders encouraging them to make the day itself constructive. Corbyn’s ill-advised intervention, refusing to accept the findings and describing the scale of Labour’s anti-Semitism problem as “dramatically overstated”, blew those plans apart. Corbyn has since issued a statement in an attempt to clarify his position, but as a result of his original comments Labour’s internal dialogue for the past five weeks has been about Corbyn. If he fully apologises now, there is no principled reason to exclude him from the Parliamentary Labour Party – only realpolitik, which would effectively mean handing the Labour right a veto over who is allowed to sit on the party’s benches.
