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Chuka Umunna: Labour should look at adopting Tory leadership contest model

Representatives from Unite and the other main unions affiliated to Labour are set to meet with Mr Watson, PLP chairman John Cryer and chief whip Rosie Winterton but also with Mr Corbyn’s allies John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor and the leader’s communications chief Seumas Milne, Channel 4 News reported.

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Mr Corbyn’s supporters are buoyed by the huge increase in Labour Party membership.

On Mr Corbyn and activists such as Momentum who support him, the source said: “When people get weaker, they shout louder”.

Mr Corbyn has faced a challenge to his authority as Labour leader after he lost a no-confidence vote and many of his shadow cabinet members, including Mr Smith, resigned.

On its website, Wallasey Branch Labour Party said: “Last night at our branch meeting Wallasey Branch Labour Party passed, with an overwhelming majority, a motion of support for Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the Labour Party”.

One passionate young demonstrator shouted into a microphone, “I want Jeremy Corbyn as leader more than anything in the world”.

Focus now switches to Saturday’s Hull North Constituency Labour Party meeting when another motion supporting Mr Corbyn will be debated by party members.

“They accept that is the right thing to do while there is a chance of some kind of deal”, one source said. The Parliamentary Labour Party have made their views very clear. Speaking to the BBC on Sunday, Lord Kinnock was adamant that the same should apply if Jeremy Corbyn is challenged.

“Our country needs a strong Labour Party with effective leadership to be listening to, and standing up for the millions that desperately need a Labour government”.

“That membership wants and expects all of us – me as leader and members of Parliament, to work together in their interests, the interests of everyone in this country, to achieve a better society, better standards of living and real equality in the future”.

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In a separate effort to step up the pressure on Corbyn, a group of Labour MPs calling themselves the Labour Campaign for Prison Reform issued a statement calling on Corbyn to appoint a shadow prisons minister, after the resignation of Andy Slaughter from the frontbench last week. And if he is challenged, many Labour MPs fear he would be re-elected.

British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn speaks during a conference in Paris on Friday