Share

UK’s Labour leader loses confidence vote over Brexit, but refuses to resign

More than a dozen Labor shadow cabinet ministers have resigned and Corbyn lost a non-binding no confidence vote among Labor MPs in the wake of his tepid support for Britain to remain in the EU.

Advertisement

Former First Minister Mr Morgan said Mr Corbyn can not carry on while most of his MPs have “no faith” in his ability to lead them into a general election.

The vote came as Mr Corbyn continued to struggle to put together a new shadow cabinet following the mass walk-out of more than half his top team, with more shadow ministers announcing their resignations.

“Today’s vote by MPs has no constitutional legitimacy”.

The result, which was expected after days of heavy criticism from within his party, has no formal effect and does not automatically trigger a leadership election.

“However, I would have to accept that, despite my own mandate of 72 per cent from the party membership, if the overwhelming majority of Labour MSPs did not support my leadership, I would not be able to do this job effectively”.

A spokesman for Corbyn said the articles were deleted because they are “converting it [the website] to reflect his work as leader and afterwards”.

He also promised to scrap Britain’s nuclear weapons if elected prime minister.

“The things that matter to them are not the things that matter to ordinary members of the party”.

There was still no shadow Scottish Secretary in place 36 hours after Edinburgh MP Ian Murray resigned.

The no-confidence motion was tabled by former public accounts committee chair and MP Margaret Hodge.

“Locally, 58% of voters supported remaining in the European Union last week and there is every indication that the anti-austerity programme taking shape under Mr Corbyn, and his shadow chancellor John McDonnell, is proving very popular with the general public”. Len McCluskey, leader of the Unite union, the single largest donor, said that the behaviour of the PLP was “extraordinary” and that “if anyone wants to change the Labour leadership, they must do it openly and democratically through an election, not through resignations and pointless posturing”.

Media reports Tuesday suggested that his former business spokeswoman Angela Eagle could be preparing to launch a bid to succeed Corbyn.

The ideal would be to take the “ultra-left rump of the Labour Party” around Corbyn and “demerge them into a separate party”.

Advertisement

But forced re-selections of every single one of the party’s 229 MPs would trigger a civil war that could dwarf even the Militant days of the 1980s, and possibly a split in the party.

Britain-EU-6-28