Jeremy Corbyn celebrates his victory following the announcement of the victor in the Labour leadership contest between him and Owen Smith at the ACC Liverpool.
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He said: “My message is, concentrate on policies, concentrate on campaigning, concentrate on what we’ve got to put out there as a message”.
“I’m reaching out to all our MPs”, he told the BBC’s Andrew…
“We have much more in common than that which divides us”.
The Streatham MP was said to have been urged to mount a challenge to Mr Corbyn, with some MPs considering him to be Labour’s only “realistic” chance of winning in 2020.
Many Labour Party members in and out of Parliament believe that Corbyn did not campaign hard enough in the June referendum on whether Britain should leave the European Union.
He said Emily Thornberry, who shadows both the foreign secretary, Boris Johnson, and the Brexit secretary, David Davis, would be holding a series of meetings in the coming weeks to firm up Labour’s position.
Green Party leaders Jonathan Bartley and Caroline Lucas said Corbyn’s first job was bringing his own party together, after which he should seek to before joining with other progressives to form a grassroots-led progressive alliance. He topped all three categories with registered supporters, affiliated supporters and party members to beat Owen Smith.
Rebel MPs at the conference in Liverpool acknowledged that Mr Corbyn’s emphatic victory nearly certainly ruled out another challenge before the next general election.
The party’s rightwing now say they need to take stock, with some pushing to regain some control of the party machinery and boost groups promoting more centre-left policies.
In interviews following the leadership result, Mr Corbyn set out plans to increase corporation tax to pay for the abolition of student tuition fees – and said he opposed recruiting more staff for MI6 to fight terrorism.
Derek Hatton applied a year ago to re-join the Labour party but said the issue is still not resolved and he is not a party member.
Former shadow cabinet minister Vernon Coaker warned: “The political terms of trade in this country are changing”.
Mr McDonnell added: “You will see it at Parliamentary Labour Party level”. M.P.s who have criticized 67-year-old Corbyn must now decide whether they are willing to serve in his top team after the mass of resignations in the summer left him unable to fill his frontbench.
Holding a copy of The World Transformed schedule of events, the Labour leader said: “This event here might be described as some kind of fringe extreme”.
“We have all been subject to massive amounts of disgraceful and disgusting vile abuse”, she said.
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“I have congratulated Jeremy on his result but I have also called on him to keep us a broad-based party”.
