Afternoon summary
- David Cameron has published the text of the motion authorising airstrikes against Islamic State (Isis) in Syria that will be put to a vote tomorrow. It had been drafted to try to appeal to Labour MPs, incorporating in approximate terms the four conditions set by Labour in the motion on Syria passed by the party at its September conference. (Some Labour MPs think the four Labour conditions have been met, but Jeremy Corbyn and others do not accept that.) MPs have been given 10 and a half hours to debate the motion, starting at 11.30am tomorrow.
- Corbyn has claimed that only a “small number” of “diehard” Labour MPs will vote for airstrikes. The latest estimates are that around 30 to 40 Labour MPs will back the government, around half the number Tory whips were reportedly expecting a few days ago. In an interview with Jeremy Vine, Corbyn said MPs should remember that Labour party members were opposed to airstrikes. There are claims that some MPs feel they are being intimidated by Corbynites into voting against the government.
- A Labour MP, Louise Haigh, has claimed that she was told at a briefing by the national security adviser that there are only 40,000 moderate opposition fighters in Syria. The government claimed in a document last week there were 70,000. She posted the claim on Twitter.
National Security Adviser confirms number of moderates on ground in Syria is 40,000 rest are much more radical Islamists
— Louise Haigh MP (@LouHaigh) December 1, 2015
But two MPs at the same briefing, Labour’s Stephen Doughty and the Conservative Gavin Barwell, said she had misunderstood what was said at the briefing.
.@LouHaigh he didn't say that Louise - and dismay in room from all sides (pro/against/unsure) that you have tweeted that from the meeting.
— Stephen Doughty (@SDoughtyMP) December 1, 2015
.@LouHaigh well he actually had to explain afterwards to clarify because you had tweeted. You'd left I think?
— Stephen Doughty (@SDoughtyMP) December 1, 2015
@LouHaigh That is NOT what he said
— Gavin Barwell MP (@GavinBarwellMP) December 1, 2015
- George Osborne, the chancellor, has said the referendum on EU membership may not be held until the end of 2017. Giving evidence to the Commons Treasury commitee, he said that if a deal could be done on reforming the relationship with Brussels he would like the vote held as soon as possible. But there was nothing to stop it being held in the second half of 2017 even though the UK would be holding the rotating presidency of the European Council then, he said. He told the MPs:
I don’t see that [the presidency] as an obstacle. That comes towards the end of the period allowed by the law that’s passing through the House of Lords at the moment, that’s the back end of 2017. As we made clear, we are going to try and negotiate this as soon as we can provided we get an agreement. We have got two years in which to do it, but if we have to have the referendum in the latter part of 2017 we will do so.
That’s all from me for today.
Thanks for the comments.
Updated
Mark Tran and Francis Churchill have written a useful guide to where national newspapers stand on airstrikes. Those against include the Guardian and the Daily Mail.
Here is the Guardian’s editorial.
Latest nos from Labour MPs in favour of airstrikes that their camp cd be as high as 60 but more likely down to 30-40 as MPs feel pressure
— Rowena Mason (@rowenamason) December 1, 2015
Corbyn aides confident that opinion on air strikes is moving their way among shadow cabinet and MPs.
— George Eaton (@georgeeaton) December 1, 2015
Labour has cancelled a phone canvassing event at party HQ tonight because of the Stop the War Coalition protest taking place there (see 3.10pm), Guido Fawkes reports.
This is from Mark Ferguson, the former LabourList editor.
Was looking forward to phone banking for @CllrJimMcMahon at Labour HQ today. It’s been cancelled due to a Stop The War demo outside *sigh*
— Mark Ferguson (@Markfergusonuk) December 1, 2015
In his Radio 2 interview Jeremy Corbyn said that he thought Labour MPs were getting more and more sceptical about the case for airstrikes. (See 12.15pm.)
As PoliticsHome’s Kevin Schofield reports, there are claims that some MPs feel intimidated by pressure from the Corbynites.
Number of Labour MPs voting for bombing likely to be 30-40. Source says: "Many are facing appalling intimidation from the anti-war brigade."
— Kevin Schofield (@PolhomeEditor) December 1, 2015
A spokesman for Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary, has responded to what Jeremy Corbyn said in his Radio 2 interview about how people would die under the policy backed by Benn. (See 2.02pm.) The spokesman said: “Inaction has a cost in lives too.”
At the Commons defence committee hearing earlier Michael Fallon, the defence secretary, said acknowledged that the 70,000 moderate Syrian opposition fighters mentioned in the government document published last week were not a coherent force. He told the committee.
Those 70,000 are not all in one place, they are not a new model army drilled outside the walls of Raqqa. They are spread through Syria. They are fighting on a whole range of fronts but they are fighting Assad.
One of the reasons for us getting more involved in fighting Isil in Syria is to relieve the pressure on them so that they are not being squeezed by both sides - by both Isil and Assad.
Lieutenant General Gordon Messenger, the deputy chief of the defence staff, who was giving evience alonside Fallon, said that while the moderate opposition was not a coherent force, it would be wrong to dismiss them as a “rag tag army”. He told the MPs:
If you look at what they have managed to achieve in terms of territory preservation in both the north and the south, it is considerable. They have been up against enormous pressure. We see them as critical to preserve in order to avoid Syria becoming essentially a choice between Assad or Isil [Isis], neither of which we assess to be acceptable.
The Stop the War Coalition is staging protests tonight outside the Labour HQ and the Conservative party HQ ahead of tomorrow’s vote.
It has also put out a statement saying those MPs most in favour of airstrikes are those with “a strong commitment to Britain’s role as a global military player, and as an unquestioning junior partner to the US as global policeman, whatever the concrete situation.”
These MPs also the people who got it wrong on Iraq, the statement says.
There is one piece of research that all MPs would do well to do in the run up to Wednesday night’s vote. Let them examine the previous judgements of those arguing to take us into the fourth war on a Muslim country in fourteen years.
Without exception, those keenest on the war, if they were in parliament, voted for the occupation of Iraq in 2003, widely regarded as the worst foreign policy disaster since Suez.
Hundreds of thousands of civilians died and the country was plunged into the very chaos from which Isis emerged.
Those voting for that war include David Cameron, Michael Fallon, Philip Hammond and George Osborne for the Tories and leading figures of the minority hawks in Labour, Hilary Benn, Tom Watson, Yvette Cooper, Maria Eagle and Angela Eagle.
George Osborne, the chancellor, is giving evidence to the Commons Treasury committee. He told it that around £200m a year was already being spent on military operations in Iraq and supporting opposition forces in Syria, and that the cost of extending airstrikes to Syria would be “in the low tens of millions of pounds”.
I think the estimate of extending air action over Syria would be in the low tens of millions of pounds. That would come out of the special reserve, which is what we established for the purposes of military action like this.
All questions in the Commons have been cancelled tomorrow to make time for the Syria debate. That means it will start at 11.30am, and run until 10pm - going on for 10 and a half hours in total.
Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary, is holding a briefing for Labour MPs this afternoon at which he will explain why he is backing airstrikes.
Jeremy Corbyn's interview with Jeremy Vine - Summary
Here is a full summary of Jeremy Corbyn’s interview with Jeremy Vine. It was one of the best he’s given as Labour leader because mostly he was just saying what he thought. Even Vine said he recognised the “force” and “conviction” Corbyn was showing.
Here are the key points.
- Corbyn said that only a “small number” of “diehard” Labour MPs were going to vote for airstrikes.
I think that there will be a large majority of Labour MPs voting against the war. There are a small number who are very diehard in supporting the war.
- He said suggested imposing a three-line whip would have made no difference because the Labour MPs supporting airstrikes would have voted with the government anyway.
They would probably have supported the war whether there was a whip or not.
He also admitted that he had a history of defying the whip himself.
- He claimed that, in opposing the government motion, he would be articulating Labour party policy. Asked what the party’s position was, he replied:
The party conference passed a resolution at Brighton at the end of September in which it said in terms that there had to be clear UN approval and there had to be a political process in Syria. There isn’t a clear political process, although one is developing through the Vienna conference, and that we welcome. It does not give authority for military action because it is not a chapter 7 resolution within the terms of the UN charter ...
My view is that the terms of the Labour party conference motion have not been met, and thererfore when I speak tomorrow to oppose the government’s military strategy in Syria, I believe I’m carrying out the terms of the Labour party conference motion.
Here is the full text of the Syria motion passed at Labour conference. Corbyn claims the Labour conditions have not been met, but others in the shadow cabinet believe they have been met.
- He repeatedly appealed to Labour MPs, including those minded to support Cameron, to vote against airstrikes tomorrow.
I appeal to them to think again. Think of the complications and the implications of what we’re doing and please cast your vote against supporting this government’s military endeavours in Syria.
MPs should think “very carefully” about voting for airstrikes, he said. They should remember the damage done by the Iraq vote. “The ghost of Iraq is still there.”
- He defended his decision to allow MPs a free vote. It meant MPs would have “no hiding place”, he said.
Maybe people should think of it another way. I’m saying to every MP; you make up your own mind, there’s no hiding place behind a whipping arrangement or not, your decision on behalf of your constituents whether or not we should commit British troops into yet another war in the Middle East, with no endgame in sight, not proper plan in sight.
- He said the 70,000 moderate Syrian opposition fighters mentioned by Cameron in his memo last week on the case for war were “mythical”. And many of them were probably not moderates, he said. He described them as “a mythical 70,000-strong apparently unknown Free Syrian Army operation, which is also infiltrated by a lot of jihadist elements”.
- He said that innocent people would die under the policy backed by Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary. Asked why Benn was supporting airstrikes, he replied:
His belief is that we can get rid of Isil by bombing them. My reply, to him and to everybody else that supports bombing - when you bomb a town like Raqqa, where there are several hundred thousand people living there, who may or may not wish to be under Isil control - indeed, many are trying to escape from there - we’re going to kill people. We’re going to kill people in their homes by our bombs. I think we should be very careful about that.
When asked why Benn did not accept this, Corbyn said Vine would have to ask Benn himself. By chance, Benn was shown being interviewed on Sky at the same time as Corbyn’s was being broadcast.
- He said he had deliberately appointed a shadow cabinet representing a wide range of views, even thought that had not made things easier. He did so because he wanted to reach out to all sections of the party, he said.
- He said Labour MPs minded to vote for airstrikes should remember that party members generally were opposed. The PLP was not the entire party, he said.
Labour MPs must be aware of what our members think, must be aware of our conference resolution and must be aware of how this whole thing can unravel in such a terrible way ...
I did point out to the PLP last night that the parliamentary Labour party is a very important part of the Labour party, but it is not the entirety of it.
- He said Labour was “very united on economic and social issues”.
- He said the claim from the Labour MP John Spellar that Corbyn and his allies were mounting a “coup” to take over the party was “complete nonsense”.
John Spellar has a renowned sense of great imagination, and a penchant for the dramatic.
Updated
Corbyn says only 'small number' of 'diehard' Labour MPs support airstrikes
In his Radio 2 interview Jeremy Corbyn said only a small number of “diehard” Labour MPs were supporting airstrikes. He said:
I think that there will be a large majority of Labour MPs voting against the war. There are a small number who are very diehard in supporting the war. They would probably have supported the war whether there was a whip or not.
I will post a full summary from the interview soon.
Updated
Full text of the Syria motion
Here is the full text of the Syria motion.
The motion will appear on the order paper as a single paragraph. Bu I have broken it up into multiple paragraphs to make it easier to read.
That this house notes that ISIL poses a direct threat to the United Kingdom;
welcomes United Nations Security Council Resolution 2249 which determines that ISIL constitutes an ‘unprecedented threat to international peace and security’ and calls on states to take ‘all necessary measures’ to prevent terrorist acts by ISIL and to ‘eradicate the safe haven they have established over significant parts of Iraq and Syria’;
further notes the clear legal basis to defend the UK and our allies in accordance with the UN Charter;
notes that military action against ISIL is only one component of a broader strategy to bring peace and stability to Syria;
welcomes the renewed impetus behind the Vienna talks on a ceasefire and political settlement;
welcomes the Government’s continuing commitment to providing humanitarian support to Syrian refugees; underlines the importance of planning for post-conflict stabilisation and reconstruction in Syria;
welcomes the Government’s continued determination to cut ISIL’s sources of finance, fighters, and weapons; notes the requests from France, the US and regional allies for UK military assistance;
acknowledges the importance of seeking to avoid civilian casualties; using the UK’s particular capabilities;
notes the Government will not deploy UK troops in ground combat operations;
welcomes the Government’s commitment to provide quarterly progress reports to the House;
and accordingly supports Her Majesty’s Government in taking military action, specifically airstrikes, exclusively against ISIL in Syria;
and offers its wholehearted support to Her Majesty’s Armed Forces.
Updated
No 10 publishes Syria motion
Downing Street has now released the full text of the motion that MPs will be asked to support tomorrow.
It is titled “Isil in Syria (United Nations Security Council Resolution 2249).
The motion says Isis poses a “direct threat” to the UK, says the UN resolution urges state to take “all necessary measures” to combat it, insists there is a legal basis for action, welcomes the Vienna peace talks, welcomes the ongoing humanitarian relief, stresses the importance of post-conflict planning and points out that the government is not committing not to deploy ground troops.
I will post the full text soon.
Updated
Number 10 will shortly release the text of the motion that MPs will vote on tomorrow. In a statement, David Cameron said that the motion would make it clear that airstrikes against Isis in Syria were part of a wider strategy. He said:
I will be making the arguments and I hope as many members of parliament - across all parties - will support me as possible.
We had a meeting of the Cabinet this morning and have agreed the motion that will be put in front of the House of Commons.
That motion talks about, yes, the necessity of taking military action agains Isil in Syria as well as Iraq, but it is part of a broader strategy.
It’s about politics and diplomacy and humanitarian aid, all of which we need to bring to bear to bring peace to Syria but to make sure we protect our national interest of fighting against this appalling terrorist organisation.
Updated
Corbyn ends by saying how “marvellous” Rosa Parks was. (Vine mentioned her earlier.)
Parks sparked the bus boycott that led to the whole civil rights movement and the end of segregation. She was an ordinary person doing something extraordinary. Our history is made by people like her, he says. The lives of millions have been improved because of what she did.
And that’s it. The interview is over. I will post a summary soon.
Q: Is there an implied threat to Labour MPs to vote for airstrikes?
Corbyn says he is not a dictator.
He has tried to reach out to people.
Don’t underestimate the shared values of the Labour party on human rights.
There is a disagreement on this, he says.
Q: That’s an understatement.
Corbyn says he is a man of moderate language.
He says he told the PLP last night that they were part of the Labour party, not the whole of it.
Updated
Q: Most Labour voters favour bombing Syria. So how can you hold Labour together when there is such division?
Corbyn says Labour is very united on economic and social issues.
He appeals to Labour MPs to think “very carefully” before voting. And they should remember the damage done by the Iraq vote in 2003.
Q: John Spellar says we are seeing an attempted coup by the “Trots” in the leader’s bunker.
Corbyn says Spellar is renown for his imagination. He says he does not agree with Spellar, and has tried to reach out to him.
He says Cameron is wrong if he thinks this will be settled militarily, not politically.
Vine plays a clip of what Diane Abbott said yesterday about a free vote giving Cameron “victory on a plate”.
Corbyn says Abbott put that view. But he does not agree, he says. A large number of Labour MPs are opposed. A small number of “diehard” Labour MPs will vote in favour. If there had been a whip, they would probably have voted for it anyway.
Vine lists some of those Labour MPs planning to vote for airstrikes.
Corbyn says he appointed these people to the shadow cabinet because he was trying to reach out to all sections of the party. He appeals to them to think again, he says.
Updated
Q: People voted for you hoping you would make Labour MPs vote against airstrikes. But you are not doing that. Why not?
Corbyn says the vote is tomorrow. He will be speaking as forcefully and strongly and firmly as he can against British intervention in Syria.
He appeals to Labour members to get in touch with their MPs and tell them what they think.
The change in public opinion in the last week alone is palpable, he says.
Labour MPs are making up their minds, he says.
All the intelligence he is getting suggests Labour MPs are getting more and more sceptical about this, he says.
Are we going to war again, he asks. Or are we going to put all our efforts into a peace process?
Updated
Jeremy Corbyn's on Radio 2's Jeremy Vine show
Jeremy Vine is interviewing Jeremy Corbyn.
Q: What is Labour’s position on Syria?
Corbyn says the party conference passed a motion at its conference. It said there had to be clear UN authorisation and a political process. But the UN resolution is not a chapter 7 one, and so it does not give clear UN authorisation. And the political peace process is not advanced enough.
Corbyn says, on that basis, he thinks he will be representing Labour opinion when he speaks in the debate tomorrow.
But Labour MPs will make their own decisions, he says.
He says Cameron is talking about a “mythical” army of Syrian moderates. They have been infiltrated by extremists, he says.
Q: So why does Hilary Benn not agree?
Corbyn says Benn thinks bombing will make the situation better. Corbyn says he disagrees.
Harman says government's failure to cooperate with drone strikes inquiry 'inexcusable'
Parliament’s joint committee on human rights is conducting an inquiry into drone strikes and Harriet Harman, the committee chair and former Labour deputy leader, has released a very strong letter criticising the government for not cooperating with it.
In the letter, addressed to Michael Fallon, the defence secretary, she outlines three specific complaints.
1) The Ministry of Defence has refused to give the committee a memorandum about drone attacks, despite “almost daily enquiries from committee staff”.
2) Ministers are refusing to let government lawyers give evidence.
3) Fallon and Jeremy Wright, the attorney general, have failed to reply to an invitation to give evidence to the committee.
Summing this up, Harman said:
Given that this inquiry is about targeted killing, a matter of the utmost seriousness, to fail to be accountable to Parliament is inexcusable.
Fallon told the defence committee a few minutes ago that he had spoken to Harman about this.
Michael Fallon has spoken to Harriet Harman this morning after she wrote to him demanding urgent info on legal status of drone killing
— Kate McCann (@KateEMcCann) December 1, 2015
Jeremy Corbyn will shortly be appearing on Radio 2’s Jeremy Vine programme.
I’ll be covering his interview in detail.
Michael Fallon, the defence secretary, is giving evidence to the Commons defence committee now. Here are some of the key points to emerge so far.
- Fallon said there was “an urgent need” for Britain to get involved in the fight against Isis in Syria.
Defence Sec Michael Fallon tells Defence Cttee: "There is an urgent need for UK to join fight against ISIL in Syria for our own security"
— Chris Ship (@chrisshipitv) December 1, 2015
- He said that Isis had inspired 150 attacks around the world this year.
Def Sec Michael Fallon says there were 150 IS-inspired attacks round world this year - compared with 15 last year.
— Susan Hulme (@Susanh12) December 1, 2015
Livingstone defends his Question Time comments
On Question Time last week Ken Livingstone blamed Tony Blair for the 52 7/7 terrorist attacks in London. His comments angered some of his Labour colleagues, and the row erupted again this morning on the BBC’s Victoria Derbyshire show.
Angela Smith, the Labour MP, said she raised this at the PLP last night. She said:
I made it clear that Ken Livingstone’s remarks about the 7/7 bombings were entirely unacceptable, that the vast majority of the British public will be appalled at what he said, to effectively blame Tony Blair - in particular to blame Western values - for the attacks on London on that day - was totally unacceptable, and that he’s made himself unfit to co-chair the defence review. I think he should resign.
Smith was in the studio, and Livingstone was taking part via a video link. Addressing him directly, she said:
Ken, are you going to resign? Do you accept that you have alienated the vast majority of the British public?
Livingstone refused. He said that, since Question Time, around 40 to 50 people had approached him on the street to say they agreed. The only criticism had come from MPs, he said. He went on:
I’ve never told a lie in public life. We know those four suicide bombers, who were born and brought up in Britain, then turned against and were prepared to blow themselves up in order to kill 52 Londoners on the streets. If you go on the messages they left, as they recorded why they were doing this, they said it’s because of our invasion of Iraq.
Tony Blair was told by our security services if you invade Iraq it increases the risk of a terrorist attack, which is why I’m really worried now about more bombing over Syria because, unless you are going to put troops on the ground to defeat Isil, they will be even more determined to come here and kill more British people.
Smith was asked to respond. She said:
This is tantamount to blaming our society, our values, for what’s happening in the Middle East and what’s happening on the streets of Western capitals across the world.
Livingstone said he agreed that we should defend our values.
Ian Murray, the shadow Scottish secretary, was in the studio with Smith and he also criticised Livingstone. He said:
I was appalled at what I heard from Ken Livingstone on Thursday. I think the vast majority of the British people will be appalled at what he said on Question Time.
But Livingstone said he was not going to apologise for telling the truth.
He also said he was not trying to excuse what the 7/7 killers did. He told the programme:
It’s outrageous, what they did is outrageous. I did not apologise for them, I did not justify what they were doing. I merely told the truth: that Tony Blair was warned that if you go in to Iraq you increase the risk of a terrorist attack in this country. I am sure that this is exactly what Cameron is doing now.
The eight Lib Dem MPs will meet later today to decide how they will vote in tomorrow’s Syria debate. According to the BBC, they are minded to support the government.
Tom Watson asks Cameron for clarity on ground troops and on the political settlement
Like others, David Cameron is probably getting a bit confused as to who speaks for the Labour party on Syria. Yesterday Jeremy Corbyn, the party leader, sent him a letter on the Syria issue, demanding a two-day debate in the Commons. Today Tom Watson, the deputy leader (who, unlike Corbyn, is in favour of air strikes) has also sent him a letter.
Watson says that, while many colleagues support the “moral and legal case for action”, a large number of Labour MPs “remain unconvinced about two areas in particular and would welcome more clarity on these issues”.
He asks Cameron for more detail on these two issues. Here are extracts from his letter.
On ground troops
Firstly, unlike in Iraq where there is a clarity of purpose and action by government led ground forces, it remains uncertain what the ground strategy in Syria would be and whether there is a coherent and capable ground force that could capitalise on the strategic advantage air strikes would give them.
This has been raised by colleagues in every political party. Your assertion that experts say there are ‘approximately 70,000 Syrian opposition fighters on the ground who do not belong to extremist groups’ has been widely challenged. Please could you explain, in detail, how this figure was compiled? The chair of the defence select committee said in the chamber that he was “extremely surprised” by this figure. His views carry great weight on both sides of the House. Are you able to explain to him, to me and others how the 70,000 figure can be used with confidence and provide more detail about where they are located?
On the political settlement
There are many MPs who understand that a transitional government in Syria can only come about if Isil [Isis] forces no longer hold territory. But they are yet to be convinced that there is a meaningful political process in place that can pull together the disparate groups who will need to sign up to it if there is to be a lasting peace.
I very much welcome the nascent Vienna Process. There needs to be a coordinated approach by all the military powers active- or in the UK’s case potentially active- in Syria. In particular we must ensure that those moderate opposition forces which have potential to take territory from ISIL are not weakened by military intervention.
However, I believe this can only come about once the Vienna Process begins to outline a broader strategy for Syria after military action has taken place. With this in mind, please can you outline a timeline for peace and the transition to arrangements for a lasting political settlement? And further to that, can you give an assessment and your view on the Saudi initiative to draw together opposition groups in Syria; how does the inclusion of conservative groups Arar Al-Sham and Jaish Al-Islam impact on the prospects for peace?
I covered some of what happened at last night’s PLP meeting on yesterday’s blog, but more details have emerged overnight and there is now a particularly detailed account by Paul Waugh and Graeme Demianyk at Huffington Post. Here’s an excerpt, but the whole report is well worth reading.
[Jack] Dromey won loud applause for attacking Mr Livingstone’s line on the BBC’s Question Time last week that the 7/7 terrorists ‘gave their lives’ for their cause in opposing Blair’s Iraq war.
Mr Dromey - husband of former acting leader Harriet Harman - said he was speaking as former assistant general secretary of the Transport and General Workers Union, one of whose members was the driver of the bus on which people were killed in Russell Square.
“How dare Ken Livingstone say what he said about those people [the terrorists] giving their lives in the 7/7 attacks? How can this man still have a role in charge of Labour’s defence review?” Mr Dromey said.
Despite long and sustained applause, Mr Corbyn didn’t reply. “He just sucked it up, he said nothing on Livingstone,” one MP said. Mr Benn, who spoke after Mr Dromey, pointedly said he agreed with everything his fellow frontbencher had said ...
And in one of the most outspoken attacks, Kevan Jones – the defence minister who recently clashed with Mr Livingstone over his mental health - accused Mr Corbyn of “subterfuge and double dealing” over the Syria vote. He said that Corbyn had been elected on a promise of straight, honest politics but after his behaviour in the past week that promise “lies in tatters.”
Benn claims Labour's decision to allow a free vote on Syria 'a strong day for democracy'
Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary, was on the Today programme this morning. As I mentioned earlier (see 9.02am), he said he had “no interest” in becoming Labour leader. Here are some of the other points he made.
- Benn said that he was backing airstrikes because he thought there was a “clear and present threat” from Isis (or Isil/Daesh, as he called it.)
- He said the recent UN security council resolution urging states to take “all necessary measures” to combat Isis was a key factor for him. This was one of the conditions that Labour set for supporting airstrikes in the motion it passed at conference, he said. (Others in the party claim the conference motion condition about UN support has not been met; Jon Lansman explains why in this Left Futures blog.)
- He said that the UK was already bombing Isis in Iraq and doing “all but” airstrikes in Syria (because the RAF is providing the US and others with surveillance and refuelling support). As far as Isis was concerned, this was “one battlefield”, he said.
- He said “people of conscience” in the Labour party had reached different views.
- He said it was “to the great credit of Jeremy [Corbyn] as leader that he has recognised that there is a difference of view on this” and that he had decided to have a free vote.
- He said people would welcome Labour’s decision to allow its MPs a free vote and that this was “a strong day” for parliament and democracy. It was an example of “a new and different kind of politics”, he said.
Do you know what? I think people looking at this will say, ‘Don’t we want our parliamentarians to weigh up all of these factors, all of the voices they are hearing, looking at the threat from Isil/Daesh, listening to the appeal from our neighbour and our ally France ... and then reach a decision about what the right thing to do is?’ I think this is a strong day for our parliament and our democracy.
- He said he had made it clear that, provided Cameron’s motion was acceptable, he was planning to vote for it. He said he was not planning to resign but he implied that, if Corbyn had tried to whip Labour MPs to vote against, he would have disobeyed the whip and challenged Corbyn to sack him.
Updated
Last night Clive Lewis, a Corbyn-supporting Labour MP, said that any of his colleagues who voted for airstrikes against Isis in Syria would have to take the blame if there were further terrorist atrocities. He was speaking just after the parliamentary Labour party (PLP) meeting and a recording of what he said was played on the Today programme earlier. Here’s the quote.
If there are members of the PLP that want to bomb in Syria and vote with the Tories, on their heads be it. They have made that decision. I respect that decision, in the sense that they have come to the conclusion they have. But ultimately if the war in Syria extends, if there’s a conflagration, there are more terrorist atrocities, if the war extends with no end, then obviously we will be looking at who voted for this, and when the blame’s apportioned, it’s their fault.
Updated
After a dramatic day at Westminster, mostly focused on the Labour party, we now know that there will be a vote on extending airstrikes against Islamic State (Isis) in Syria in the Commons tomorrow night. David Cameron seems certain to win, and RAF jets are expected to launch bombing raids later this week.
Here is our overnight story summarising yesterday’s events.
And here are the key developments overnight.
- Jeremy Corbyn has accused Cameron of rushing to war because his case is “falling apart”. This is from a spokesman for the Labour leader.
By refusing a full two day debate, David Cameron is demonstrating he knows the debate is running away from him, and that the case he made last week is falling apart. The prime minister should stop the rush to war to allow for a full discussion of the issues in parliament. Matters of national security are far too important to be bulldozed through the House of Commons for political convenience.
- Number 10 wants to cancel PMQs tomorrow to allow more time for the Syria debate, it has emerged.
- Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary, has said he has “no interest” in replacing Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader. The question was asked on the Today programme because in some Labour circles he is being talked up as a possible replacement.
- Ken Livingstone, the Labour leftwinger and co-chair of the party’s defence review, has said that attacking Isis in Syria will make the UK more vulnerable to terror attacks. Speaking on the Today programme he said:
No-one is going to get safer. We are going to get more at-risk. I should imagine the security services are warning the prime minister that we are already at risk and that this bombing exercise will almost certainly heighten that risk. They will be more determined to come here and kill us.
I will be focusing mostly on Syria developments this morning, but I will be keeping an eye on other stories too. Here is the agenda for the day.
9.30am: The cabinet meets and is due to approve Cameron’s decision to call a vote on Syria tomorrow.
9.45am: Andrew Selous, the justice minister, gives evidence to the Commons justice committee on prison safety.
11am: Alan Johnson, the Labour former home secretary, launches Labour’s campaign to remain in the EU at an event in Birmingham.
11.30am: Michael Fallon, the defence secretary, gives evidence to the Commons defence committee about the defence review.
12pm: Number 10 lobby briefing.
1.30pm: George Osborne, the chancellor, gives evidence to the Commons Treasury committee. The hearing will cover two topics: first, the economic costs and benefits of EU membership, and then the autumn statement.
As usual, I will also be covering breaking political news as it happens, as well as bringing you the best reaction, comment and analysis from the web. I will post a summary at lunchtime and another in the afternoon.
If you want to follow me or contact me on Twitter, I’m on@AndrewSparrow.
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