“The National Executive Committee (NEC) will now be asked to authorise a full report to be drawn up with recommendations for disciplinary action if appropriate”.
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Van Vliet told McNicol he found it “unacceptable that Mr Fisher is now allowed to remain a party member” because he urged people to consider supporting parties other than Labour.
Mr Fisher’s appointment is one of a number to Mr Corbyn’s close circle that have proved controversial among Labour MPs.
Ms Benn – the granddaughter of Labour’s former Cabinet minister Tony Benn – made a formal complaint about Mr Fisher after he sent a tweet in August previous year, which read “FFS if you live in Croydon South, vote with dignity, vote @campaignbeard” – a reference to the Twitter account of Class War parliamentary candidate Jon Bigger.
Labour president Nigel Haworth has admitted that the party has a way to go if it’s to win the next election.
But within hours of Mr Corbyn’s Oldham rebuff came the announcement from Labour headquarters that Mr Fisher, a former head of policy for PCS, the left-wing civil service union, had been suspended following complaints about his conduct.
Andrew Fisher, Corbyn’s policy advisor, had his party membership suspended on Friday as part of an increasingly public battle for control of the party between backbench Labour MPs and the party leader.
“I obviously do not and did not support Class War in any way, let alone in an election”.
Under Labour rules, it is an offence for members to endorse non-party candidates.
The battle is another sign Labour moderates are organising against Corbyn within the party organisation. Going on like this, we will continue to keep the Conservatives in power.
Labour needs to get its act together, make changes and present itself as a united, disciplined political party if it wants to have any chance of success in 2017, its president says.
But former London mayor Ken Livingstone dismissed the complaint against Mr Fisher as a “complete nonsense” and accused “Blairite MPs” of trying to undermine Mr Corbyn’s leadership. “The people driving this are trying to undermine the leader who has just been elected, and that’s completely unacceptable”, he said.
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He added: “I don’t believe that people are bought in by Ukip, I think their headline message of division I don’t think plays very well in a town like Oldham because we have learned to unify, to get on, to focus on our future rather than being dragged back into the past”.
