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A VERY public row broke out between Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana – the two founders of new left-wing movement Your Party – yesterday.
It all started with a membership link that was sent to all Your Party supporters – some 800,000 apparently – at 11.20am on Thursday.
In just two hours, more than 20,000 people had joined, according to Sultana on X.
It was happening. The party, which is not yet official with a founding conference scheduled for late November, was finally taking shape.
And then it all came crashing down.
Corbyn posted a statement describing the email as “unauthorised” and warned people not to sign up via the link.
The former Labour leader and Independent MP for Islington North also said “legal advice is being taken” over the message, which featured the names of the four other independent MPs who have set up an ad-hoc parliamentary group with him.
Any direct debits should be “immediately cancelled”, he added.
Sultana then hit back with her own statement. It was a bombshell – claiming to have been “sidelined” by the above MPs, subjected to a “sexist boys’ club”, excluded and “treated appallingly”.
It only got worse later in the evening, with the party saying it had reported itself to the UK’s data protection watchdog over the morning email, claiming that a “false membership system has been unilaterally launched”. An absolute mess.
It has also sent shockwaves through Your Party branches across the UK – including those in Scotland.
The Your Party Edinburgh branch scrambled into a Zoom call to discuss what had just happened and released a statement.
“The excitement of this morning’s opening of Your Party’s membership has already given way to gossip and rumour of infighting among the MPs, and many are worried about the impact this will have on the launch of Your Party”, it read.
“Fortunately, Your Party doesn’t belong to the MPs: It belongs to all of us. The events of today are exactly why grassroots power is what the country needs.”
The National spoke to one of the organisers of the Edinburgh branch, who said this infighting has come as a “disappointment” to activists trying to build up their local branches.
“But we're gonna continue that work and I think that is reflected across the country. There's lots of different statements coming out from various branches who are reiterating their focus on their local organising.”
At Your Party Glasgow, the sentiment is similar.
“Without sending too twee, people seem kind of galvanised,” one organiser told The National – later adding that there is also a fair amount of frustration.
“And I think that the message from Scotland has always been a bit less Westminster-centric than it would be in England, and probably a bit more sceptical of tying political hopes to two individuals anyway,”
“This wasn't ideal, but you know – things are more important and bigger than just Jeremy and Zarah.
They added: “It was completely unnecessary. There was no need for that to happen in public. But it's happened now, we need to move on. Like, a path forward needs to be found basically. That's very much the narrative coming from everyone because everyone's kind of like: for fuck's sake, why did that have to happen.”
“Everyone needs to calm down. Everyone needs to figure out a way forward. The membership launch needs to kind of restart and basically everyone needs to get behind it, and everyone needs to just work towards the founding confidence and focus on that.”
Meanwhile, another organiser at Your Party Glasgow said: “Well, it's not ideal. But Glasgow and Scotland will keep organising at grassroots level and build the movement from the bottom up – as it should be.
“it's a pity because the press – it looks bad. It's such a complicated story at the top that I don't think any of us really know what's going on.
“But there's been a phrase going around in the WhatsApp groups: Keep the heid. And I think that's just what Glasgow and other parts of the country need to do.”
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