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Jeremy Corbyn: Not a disaster for frontbench to split on Trident

In response to Mr Corbyn’s interview, Business Secretary Sajid Javid said: “The Labour leader confirmed that he would weaken our defences by scrapping our independent nuclear deterrent and that he would damage our economy by putting up taxes on jobs, earnings, investment and people’s homes”.

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Corbyn was elected Labour leader two weeks ago with an overwhelming mandate from party members but the support of less than 10 percent of its lawmakers. Sources close to the shadow foreign secretary, who is one of Labour’s leading moderates, told the Telegraph that Benn was asked to step down by Corbyn.

In his most significant speech yet, the new Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn will say: “It is this sense of fair play, these shared majority British values, that are the fundamental reason why I love this country and its people”.

He accepted the cost of replacing Trident with a new generation of nuclear submarines, put at £100 billion over its lifetime, was frustrating but the union chief insisted: “The most important thing is to defend those communities; these jobs are skilled and have an impact right throughout the defence and manufacturing sectors, and so that is our responsibility”.

Corbyn advocates scrapping the programme, and says Britain should not have “weapons of mass destruction”.

Mr Corbyn has faced strong criticism for bringing members of the IRA to the House of Commons during the 1980s.

“They want us to believe there is no alternative”, he said.

“This is an open and democratic party, and the members at conference have chose to discuss the issues that they want to debate this week”, Corbyn said.

Sky’s Senior Political Correspondent Sophy Ridge said most unions did not want the motion to be debated by the conference because it risked a split in the party.

In her speech to conference, Kezia Dugdale, the Scottish Labour leader, said “the gap between the richest and the rest” has increased in Scotland’s schools during the SNP’s eight years in power, while hospitals are “creaking at the seams”.

She said: “I congratulate Jeremy Corbyn and Tom Watson on their convincing victories in this election”.

We would certainly expect Labour Party conference to be a big festival of fiscal expansion.

He continued: “Politics is a tough game, we all know that, but I had lots of colleagues who didn’t deserve to lose, and in the fullness of time they’ll reflect back on that”.

Britain’s Labour party leader, Jeremy Corbyn, applauds during the…

“I just don’t think it’s sustainable for us to free vote everything and, frankly, it’s not sustainable for different people in our leadership to be saying different things”.

Taking the stage at the Bournemouth worldwide Centre, Ms Lucas said: “We are under no illusions: for more than 20 years, governments have been meeting at global conferences to talk endlessly about the crisis, yet greenhouse gas emissions have continued to rise”.

Ahead of this weekend’s Labour Party conference in Brighton, Mr McDonnell told The Guardian: “We accept we are going to have to live within our means and we always will do – full stop”.

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But he told the packed hall: “It didn’t help our national security when we went to war with Iraq in defiance of the United Nations and on a false prospectus”.

News      Jeremy Corbyn Labour leader faces Trident split
             A free vote on the issue looks likely      
     
       By Jamie Smith-       September 27