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Two Co-op MPs quit shadow minister roles
Jeremy Corbyn’s protracted reshuffle will continue as he seeks to fill holes left by three shadow ministers who quit in protest on a day of bitter recriminations within the party ranks at Westminster.
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Mr Corbyn compared his sacking of various shadow front-benchers as a board game and signed off the negotiations over text message.
Labour’s finance spokesman, John McDonnell, said Mr Corbyn had questioned some leading lawmakers’ loyalty.
Mr Dugher had shown “incompetence” and “serial disloyalty”, while Mr McFadden had made thinly-veiled criticisms of the leader on issues such as his response to the Paris terror attacks.
The reshuffle also saw Hilary Benn remain in his position as shadow foreign secretary after speculation that Mr Corbyn would force him out.
And there will now be the “closest cooperation” with his shadow teams after he ousted critic Michael Dugher and sacked pro-Trident Maria Eagle from the Defence brief.
Mr Benn reached an agreement with Mr Corbyn that means on a free vote, where MPs vote according to conscience and not the party line, if he disagreed with the leader Mr Benn would have to give any speech from the back benches and not the front bench.
“I didn’t know before today what Jonathan Reynolds looked like, they’re not exactly household names and I think there are plenty of other people who can do his job”.
Mr Corbyn said he was onstage at a central London rally, which began at 6.30pm on Wednesday January 6, as he finally put an end to a reshuffle which began on Monday lunchtime.
Asked whether the scheme was rejected for being too expensive, the Downing Street source said: “The decisions you make are on what is the most effective way to use the resources you have got”.
He told the journalists in Westminster: “This building – keep it a secret – is full of people that speak at great length on lots of things and so I sat in my office until midnight two nights running…”
Since his election, the party has been split between centrists who broadly identify with the policies of former Labour prime ministers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown and left-wingers, particularly grassroots activists, who voted in Corbyn as leader.
Pat said: “I am delighted with the new role but do not underestimate the size of the job”. She ran into trouble and had to resign from Miliband’s shadow Cabinet in November 2014, when she was considered to have mocked working-class tastes in a Twitter post.
Maria Eagle has been named shadow culture secretary after the removal of Michael Dugher from the role.
McDonnell said Corbyn was trying to “hold everyone together but be very clear about our direction of travel in terms of policy”. “But I don’t regret it for one second”.
The moves provoked three resignations by Labour frontbenchers – Kevan Jones, Jonathan Reynolds and Stephen Doughty. Instead, they took to the airwaves to describe their sackings in great detail.
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“Hilary Benn has ensured that he works more closely with Jeremy in the future and that he will be representing the views of the Labour Party”, he said.