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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Politics
Andrew Sparrow

Guardian Labour leadership hustings - Politics live

Hugh Muir asks the four Labour leadership contenders what the Labour party is for, at the Guardian’s Labour leadership hustings event

Guardian Labour hustings - Summary and verdict

If the object of the exercise was to impress the Guardian panel, all four Labour leadership candidates failed. (See 8.35pm.) We’ve had more than 20 hustings now and what was good about this one was that it involved particularly detailed questioning. All candidates, but particularly the favourite, Jeremy Corbyn, were pressed hard on how they would persuade the electorate to back their positions on the economy, welfare and immigration when at the election voters very clearly rejected Labour’s stance on these issues. This line of questioning reflects the argument from James Morris, Labour’s pollster under Ed Miliband, in this analysis of the reason’s for Labour’s defeat.

None of the candidates could offer particular persuasive answers to this electoral conundrum, which explained the collective thumbs down at the end.

But an audience poll would probably have given a very different result. Corbyn seemed the most popular candidate, and he had the clearest, most appealing messages (or most appealing to Labourites). Judged as a debating contest, Yvette Cooper was probably best. Her exchanges with Andy Burnham on the economy were particularly lively and even though he may have had the better case - “We did spend a little bit too much before the crash, but it didn’t matter, and so we should not say sorry”, was her line; Burnham said if you spent too much, you should say so - she prevailed over him rhetorically. But Burnham had his impressive moments too, and he was particularly good at using an answer on the welfare vote (an embarrassing issue for him) to deliver a stirring “unity is strength” riff. Liz Kendall seemed too rely too much on over-familiar stock answers, although she was robust on Europe.

Here are the key news points.

  • Corbyn signalled that, if he becomes leader, he will downplay the role MPs and the shadow cabinet play in determining party policy and let ordinary party members have much more say. Addressing this point, he said:

This is the first [leadership election] where the role of the parliamentary party is minimal. It does mean the whole dynamic of the Labour party has changed because it means that whoever is elected leader will have a mandate from a very large membership and it does mean we need to change the way we make policy. I don’t think we can go on having policy made by the leader/shadow cabinet/PLP, it’s got to go much wider. Party members need to be more enfranchised ...

We’re living in a society where people communicate with people very quickly and very easily. They can push forward. I think we need to catch up as a party as party and political system with the speed of process ... That means a big change with the way Labour party does things.

He also indicated that he would not apply a top-down approach to party discipline in the Commons. He would not “corral”, MPs he said. If MPs did not accept the party line, there would be discussion, and perhaps compromise, he indicated.

  • Burnham suggested that the system that allowed people to become registered members and vote in the leadership election by paying just £3 needed to be reviewed after it was over.
  • Burnham said that he would change Labour party rules at next month’s party conference to give the Scottish Labour party more autonomy if he became leader.
  • Corbyn said that the SNP had a “fundamental problem” because its support was spread too widely. It was trying to span a spectrum from the pro-market right to the socialist left, he said. At some point this would become unsustainable, he argued.
  • Burnham said Labour should not support David Cameron’s EU renegotiation until the full details are available. But he also said Labour should be pro-European.
  • Corbyn said he was “very wary” of Cameron’s EU renegotation and did not rule out supporting EU withdrawal at some point in the future. He said:

I think we have to be very wary of what Cameron is doing, why we’re having the referendum at all and what he’s trying to negotiate because Europe is changing a great deal. It’s changed since Maastricht into much more of a market Europe than a social Europe, or a welfare europe. While we’re not in the euro zone, the European central bank has behaved in an incredibly brutal way towards the people of Greece and indeed is about to do the same, I suspect, to other countries. I think we should be in the debate demanding much greater levels of social protection across Europe. Trying to end the race to the bottom on corporate tax in Europe, end the tax evasion that is systematic across Europe.

Asked if he could imagine backing British withdrawal from the EU, he replied:

At the present time, no, I don’t see that. But I do see that Europe is changing very fast and it is not changing in a good direction ... We’re just saying Europe fine, Europe yes. It doesn’t matter what they do. We’ve got to be much tougher about what kind of Europe we want to live in.

  • Cooper and Burnham both said Britain should take more Syrian refugees.

That’s all from me.

Thanks for the comments.

Updated

The Twitter commentariat have spoken and delivered their verdicts on the Guardian Labour leadership hustings. Here’s an overview:

Well, you can’t accuse the Guardian of being too rose-tinted about Labour. All three Guardian columnists on the panel concluded with what was effectively a thumbs down to all the candidates. (See 8.35pm.)

I will post a full summary soon.

As the audience leaves, they’re playing the Smiths’ Panic on the loudspeakers. That seems to sum up the Behr/Perkins/Harris verdict.

Muir invites the panel to sum up.

Behr says it is great that there is passionate, strong feeling. But he is concerned that we have heard a lot about the need to challenge myths, about spending, about immigration, about benefits. But people voted on these myths. How will you tell people they were wrong, and maybe a bit thick?

Perkins says it is great that people were passionate. But she remembers last time Labour lost the confidence of the electorate. The last time this happened the answer was New Labour. She is not convinced the candidates are addressing the need for change.

Harris says he has thought for some time that Labour has not left the 20th century. He still thinks that. He likes the fact that there is more passion in the contest; we have Corbyn to thank for that. He would like a candidate with the candour of Kendall, and the principles of Corbyn. But he is not sure whether anyone can provide that.

Muir is summing up. Corbyn says that this is the 24th hustings they have done.

And that’s it.

Burnham says he would give the Scottish party more autonomy. He would push through changes at the party conference this year.

  • Burnham says he would change party rules at next month’s party conference to give the Scottish Labour party more autonomy.


Corbyn says Labour said at the election it was pro-Trident, and offering austerity-lite. But that is not what Scotland wanted. That was demoralising for Labour supporters, he says.

The SNP has a fundamental problem, he says. It is trying to span a spectrum from the pro-market right to the socialist left. At some point it will break, he says.

He says he did four rallies in Scotland last week. It was fascinating. Many people coming to the rallies were SNP voters.

Q: Can Labour win back Scotland?

Kendall says Labour has been losing support in Scotland for some time.

She would like to see a more federal Labour party, she says.

Cooper says nationalism is a threat to Labour. It needs to affirm the principles of solidarity, she says.

Behr says he is not clear how Labour can argue for a different vision of Europe when it is in opposition.

Burnham says Labour can speak with one voice. The Tories cannot, he says. Pro-Europeans are relying on Labour to make the case.

Behr says that the left will be split on this. And you have just said you cannot say whether you will support Cameron on his renegotiation, he tells Burnham.

Cooper says Britain will never be able to properly address its problems if it pulls out of the EU.

Burnham says Labour is not signed up to Cameron’s vision of Europe. That is why Labour needs its own campaign.

He says he wants the NHS to be excluded from TTIP.

And Labour should not commit itself to support Cameron’s deal until it has seen what he has negotiated, he says.

  • Burnham says Labour should not agree to support Cameron’s EU renegotiation until the final text is negotiated.

Corbyn says we should be “very wary” of what David Cameron is trying to achieve with his renegotiation.

The EU is changing, he says. It has behaved very brutally towards Greece. And it will probably turn to other countries too.

We should be making demands on workers’ conditions and workers’ rights.

Q: Can you imagine campaigning to leave?

Under present circumstances, no, says Corbyn. But Europe is changing very fast. We are not putting enough pressure on Europe to resist that.

Updated

Q: Can you ever imagine campaigning to leave the EU?

No, says Kendall. Labour needs to make a positive case for Europe.

Updated

Kendall says immigration is a very difficult issue. Opinion is divided. She is very proud to represent Leicester, a very diverse city.

Corbyn says migrants make a net contribution to the economy. And 2m people from Britain live abroad. Foreign students should be able to stay here a year or two after completing their studies, she says.

Often very well qualified refugees face deprivation. That is a shame on this country.

Harris goes next.

Q: I agree with what you say. But I’ve been to low-wage towns, like Wisbech in Cambridgeshire, with large Eastern European populations where local people feel an incredible amount of resentment nd unease about how their town has changed. And employers are using legal means, like shift patterns, to exclude people from the labour market. I find myself thinking there should be restrictions on EU movement.

Corbyn says he has been to Wisbech too. The immigrants should contribute to the town. And the unions should campaign to protect workers’ rights.

Burnham says he does not support abandoning free movement of labour in the EU.

Updated

Q: Europe wants us to take 20,000 Syrian refugees? Would you back that?

Cooper says Britain is only taking a few hundred Syrian refugees. We should take far more.

It is important to separate the issue of asylum from the issue of immigration generally, she says.

She says some local authorities would take more asylum seekers. But they do not get the help they need from government. They should get it.

  • Cooper says Britain should take many more Syrian refugees.

Updated

Q: With regard to immigration, do you think Britain is full?

No, says Burnham. As shadow health secretary he knows how important a party migrants play in the NHS. But Labour cannot keep avoiding people’s eyes on the subject of immigration. Immigration is having an effect on housing. We need changes.

And Britain should accept refugees as its contribution to the EU refugee crisis.

Q: How many?

Probably “towards the thousands”, he says. Countries like Greece are taking many more.

Q: So you would sign up to an EU-wide agreement on this. This would be presented as you letting the EU decide. How would you explain that to a voter who does not trust Labour on immigration.

Burnham says there are different rules for EU and non-EU migration. On EU migration, he wants changes to the rules.

Asylum is different too, he says. Britain should play its part in taking more refugees as part of an EU-wide resettlement scheme.

  • Burnham says Britain should participate in an EU-wide refugee resettlement scheme.

This is the full exchange on migration:

Updated

Q: [To Corbyn] Did you need feel inclined to support the party stance on the welfare bill?

Corbyn says the party’s stance was wrong. And its amendment opposing the bill was wrong too, because it accepted the principle of a welfare cap.

This is the candidate’s full exchange on welfare:

Updated

Q: Why did Burnham, Cooper and Kendall oppose on the vote on the welfare bill?

There is a round of applause just for the question.

Burnham says he argued for the party to vote against in shadow cabinet. But there was a decision to abstain on the main vote. He did not want to split the party. Unity is strength, he says. Because he has been loyal to the party, he will be able to demand loyalty from MPs when they oppose the welfare bill at the next vote.

Cooper says the vote was a mess.

Kendall says she agrees that the vote was a mess. But Labour was not trusted on welfare, she says.

Updated

Corbyn says the minimum wage should be £10 an hour. There should be caps on private sector rents. Universal credit will punish a lot of claimants, he says.

Kendall says Harris is right. Too many people believe that the welfare system offers something for nothing. Universal credit is a “complete and utter mess”.

Q: Would you scrap it?

It’s a complete mess, she says.

Liz kendall
Liz kendall

Updated

Harris goes next. He says his job has involved going around the country over the last years, in an ever deeper state of misery.

Q: People do not support welfare spending. That makes me miserable. But what can we do about that?

Corbyn says the welfare system is meant to keep people out of destitution. But it does not work. Just look at the poverty around. Much of the money goes at people on low-pay in work, and much of it goes subsidising high rents in the private rented sector.

He says he has had these discussions many times. Often there are unpleasant stories told about people. Some papers report them as fact. People on benefits often take sanctions. Life on benefits is tough. Some families look forward to the summer holidays not with excitement, but with dread, because they won’t get free school meals.

Behr says most Labour supporters will agree, if it is put like that.

So why don’t we put it like that, says Corbyn.

Q: How are you going to change people’s minds, then? People believe the Tory narrative on welfare?

Burnham says we need a Labour narrative. Why are so many people unable to get a home? Because of right-to-buy. If it had not been for right-to-buy, the housing benefit bill would be lower.

Q: If the ambition is to support people, do you support the aims and ambitions of universal credit?

Burnham says we have to change the DWP regime, which is there to dehumanise people. He would give councils control over the DWP budget.

Cooper says universal credit will make people worse off.

Updated

Kendall says she agrees with Harris’s point. Labour did not broaden the economy enough. It was too reliant on financial services.

Corbyn says Labour did some good things in office. But it did not do enough to address inequality, and it did not do enough to promote manufacturing. Shouldn’t we be getting the money taken out of the economy by the banks?

The last Labour govenment made a huge mistake believing capital investment could be funded by the private finance initiative.

This gets perhaps the longest round of applause so far.

Burnham says Cooper is half right. The spending did not cause the crash. But you have to be honest about the past. Labour has a good record. It did fix the roof when the sun was shining. But the Oxford Economic Review concluded that fiscal policy should have been “slightly tighter” in the runup to the crash, and that the banks were too lightly regulated. That analysis is right, he says. Labour should say so.

Andy Burnham
Andy Burnham

Cooper says she does not accept that the government was not strong enough to withstand the crash.

Harris takes her up on this.

Q: We had a housing bubble. Credit had run amok. That made Britain more vulnerable. That has to be part of the reckoning.

Cooper says there should have been better regulation of the banks.

She says Burnham has apologised for Labour’s public spending.

Burnham says he said the deficit was too high. And Harris made a good point, he says; the economy was not broad enough. And fiscal policy was too loose.

Cooper asks: Did we spend too much on public services?

But we don’t get an answer from Burnham. Harris tells Cooper he thinks she might not accept Labour’s mistakes.

Cooper says we should not knock the public services.

Updated

Cooper says it was not the deficit that caused the crisis. It was the crisis that caused the deficit. Labour should never let people think otherwise.

Q: How do you persuade people of that?

Cooper says she and Burnham disagree over the past. She thinks he is wrong to apologise for Labour’s spending record.

Looking ahead, Labour needs to set out an alternative to George Osborne’s 40% cuts. But, unlike Corbyn, she does not think printing money is the solution.

Corbyn says the crash was caused by the fact that the banks were not properly regulated. They would all agree on that.

Jeremy Corbyn discusses the causes of the credit crunch
Jeremy Corbyn discusses the causes of the credit crunch

Osborne is proposing more austerity. There is a political agenda, involving shrinking the state.

His suggestions - and they are just suggestions - include a national investment bank, with some funding from quantitative easing and some from government borrowing.

You cannot cut your way to prosperity. You have to grow your way out of austerity.

Here’s the exchange:

Updated

Anne Perkins goes next.

Q: [To Kendall] Labour did not persuade the electorate that the deficit was not too big. How can you change that?

Kendall says Labour has to say loudly and clearly it did not create the deficit and the debt.

She says Jon Cruddas’s research on the election shows that people did not believe Labour would get the deficit down. They want a government that is fiscally responsible.

But Ed Miliband was right to say most people were not feeling the benefits of growth.

Harris says Burnham started his campaign with a speech in the offices of Ernst and Young, a firm that made money from tax avoidance. And he spoke about the need for benefit cuts.

Burnham says no party can win if it is seen as anti-business.

Q: You talked recently about the need for taxing the rich more. You were not saying that at the start of the campaign.

Burnham says he does not accept that. His plans for social care implied higher tax. And he has called for a land value tax.

Harris says he thinks the contest may be over.

Q: Why has it changed so much? Why has ordinary political sense been turned on its head?

Cooper says there was a lot of anger.

She says “Jaz” (or was it “Jez” - I could not hear clearly) has a lot of support. But the polls were wrong at the election. Betting companies do not have a hotline to the heart of Labour, she says.

Yvette Cooper answering questions at hustings
Yvette Cooper.

That gets a hearty round of applause.

Burnham says Harris’s question is a good one. He has thought about it a lot. People are responding to Corbyn because they are disillusioned with the way politics works. He is too. This happened over Hillsborough. And twice he tried to get Labour to adopt a proper integrated health/social care reform. Yet Labour could not address this. People are crying out for big policies. The modern Labour party could not have created the modern NHS.

Updated

Rafael Behr says Corbyn rebelled against the party often.

Q: If you win, how will you be able to get MPs to back you, and corral them into voting with you?

Corbyn asks why Behr uses the word “corral”. It does not have to be like that. If MPs disagree, they should say so. Sometimes there will be compromise. The idea that it can all be top-down is out-of-date.

Jeremy Corbyn answering questions at hustings
Jeremy Corbyn answering questions at hustings

Q: Will Corbyn be able to run a disciplined party?

Kendall says the contest is not over yet.

Q: You said you would not serve under him.

Kendall says she has not been offered anything.

Updated

Corbyn says the dynamic of the contest has changed. Whoever wins will have a mandate from a large membership. That means the way the party makes policy has to change. Party members and party conference need a bigger say. Ideas are spread quickly. That means Labour has to change.

  • Corbyn says Labour members need to have a bigger say in making policy.

John Harris says he probably has a better idea of what Labour stands for now.

Q: Has your message changed during the campaign? And got clearer?

Cooper says she hopes her message has got clearer. Labour lets people down if it does not succeed. Labour must be true to its values, but strong enough to win an election too.

Q: [To Kendall] What do you think of the new leadership election rules? Would you change the process? Has it put Labour in better shape to take on the Tories?

Kendall says it is “brilliant” that so many people have joined to take part. Labour has to get them more involved in the party.

Liz Kendall at Guardian Labour leadership hustings
Liz Kendall answering questions about the electoral system.

Burnham says it has been a long campaign - so long that he can just about remember being the frontrunner.

(That’s the first decent joke from a candidate.)

Having stood last time, he thinks this system is better, he says. Last time an MP’s vote was worth 1,000 members’ votes. The new system has forced the candidates to address the members more. Of course there are issue to look at with regard to the £3 supporters.

  • Burnham suggests the £3 registered supporters scheme needs to be reviewed.

Harris says that there is something wrong with Labour having to check Facebook to see if they have ever said something positive about another party. That does not reflect the way the world works.

This gets a strong round of applause.

Corbyn backs up Harris. He says it is good that the party is bringing people in.

Updated

Guardian Labour leader hustings
Liz Kendall, Jeremy Corbyn, Yvette Cooper, Andy Burnham and Hugh Muir at the Guardian Labour leader hustings in London.

Muir introduces the candidates on to the stage. Jeremy Corbyn gets the loudest cheers.

Q: What is the Labour party for?

Yvette Cooper says for equality, and for equal respect for every human. And for solidarity - we think we are stronger together. And for a progressive, optimistic view of the future. And for internationalism.

Liz Kendall says equality and social justice. She wants to be the next leader because your chance of fulfilling your potential should never depend on who your parents were, your gender, your race or your sexuality. She believes in solidarity. But Labour needs to win back 94 seats to form a government.

Andy Burnham says he wants a country where your postcode does not determine your future. But that is how it works now. He joined Labour to change that.

Jeremy Corbyn says Labour should be proud of its socialist principles. It should hold power to account, and promote equality; there is gross inequality. It should stand for human rights, peace, justice and living in harmony with the natural world.

These are the opening statements:

Opening statements.

Updated

Hugh Muir is opening the event. There are 1,000 people here, he says. But we could have sold four times as many tickets, he says.

Why? Because this is the most important Labour leadership contest for a generation, he says. It will decide the party’s future - and whether it even have a future, according to some.

(Perhaps he’s been reading Lord Mandelson - see 6.22pm.)

We’re starting proper now.

The audience are now being shown a John Harris video about the plight of Labour.

Guardian Labour hustings

The event will be starting soon. We are at the Emanuel Centre in London.

The hashtag is #GuardianLive.

It’s a Guardian Live event and we’ve billed it as “The future of Labour: Meet the next Labour leader.” Perhaps we should just call it” “Meet Jeremy”. Whatever, our hustings was apparently four-time oversubscribed and we’ve had to move it to a venue that seats around 1,000 people. It starts at 7pm and I will be covering it in detail, as well as presenting analysis and reaction afterwards.

The four Labour leadership candidates - Jeremy Corbyn, the leftwinger who has become the surprise favourite, Andy Burnham, Yvette Cooper and Liz Kendall - have attended more than 20 hustings events now, but tonight’s should be different from the others (and hopefully better). The candidates will be taking questions from a panel of Guardian columnists. Hugh Muir will be chairing, and the other writers taking part are John Harris, Anne Perkins and Rafael Behr. At this stage in the contest the candidates have all given their stock answers a thousand times already. Hopefully tonight we’ll get beyond the stock answers and into new territory.

You’ll be able to watch the hustings live. There’s a live stream here, and we will embed it at the top of this blog when the event starts.

Here are some of today’s key developments.

  • Lord Mandelson, the former Labour business secretary, has said that the election of Corbyn as leader would make the party “unelectable” and could even prove fatal to it. He made the claim in an article in the Financial Times. He said:

It would be a sad and possibly final chapter in the British Labour party’s history. If the leadership election that closes in two weeks’ time is won by Jeremy Corbyn, the current favourite, his policies — printing money, state ownership of major industries, unilateral disarmament and quitting Nato — will make the party unelectable. That would be a very bad outcome for anyone who cares about fairness in our society or Britain’s place in the world. For those of us who have once before trodden the road of rebuilding Labour, it would also be a poignant one.

He said that Labour modernisers have been at fault.

The Labour party’s modernisers, who led the party’s reinvention in the 1990s, have also been at fault. In failing to acknowledge past mistakes and define what New Labour should mean for new times, we have allowed critics within the party to create a caricature of modernisation as a sectarian creed alien to the party’s values and history. It is the opposite: a politics firmly in the party’s historical mainstream of standing up for the many not the few in today’s world.

And he said “a new, younger generation of Labour reformers” had to lead the fightback and praised Tristram Hunt and Chuka Umunna’s group, Labour for the Common Good.

  • It has emerged that a paper coffee cup used by Corbyn is on sale on eBay. This is from the Press Association.

Fans of the Labour leadership frontrunner are going to new heights in the latest phase of Corbynmania as a coffee cup, listed online as “Jeremy Corbyn used coffee cup,” is being sold on eBay with current bidding at 19 after 16 bids.

The item description, written on August 20 when it was listed, claims Corbyn handed the seller the cup at the Playhouse in Nottingham and says all money raised will go to Age UK.

It reads: “Ok this is obviously aimed at a niche interest group but Jeremy handed me his empty coffee cup at tonight’s gathering outside the Playhouse in Nottingham. I realise most people would have put it in the bin but I asked what would JC do and concluded that if people in need benefit, it would be ok.

“I hope he agrees or at least understands. So I am auctioning it to benefit Age UK Notts. If we sell for over 50 I will try and get him to sign it too. Thanks”

I’ve just off to the hustings venue now. I will post again before 7pm.

Updated

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