The Labour party was left in deadlock on Tuesday night after the party’s national executive committee failed to reach a consensus about how to persuade MPs to return to Jeremy Corbyn’s frontbench.
In a meeting that lasted more than eight hours, the Labour leader refused to sign up to plans put forward by his deputy under which Labour politicians would be allowed to vote for the shadow cabinet.
Tom Watson argued that the move would help Corbyn to broker peace with his parliamentary party by offering politicians who lost confidence in the leadership during the summer a “dignified” way back.
Corbyn – who is widely expected to triumph in the party’s leadership battle when a winner is announced on Saturday – used the meeting to tell NEC colleagues that he felt upset and disappointed about the way in which droves of MPs had resigned from the frontbench after the EU referendum result.
He did agree to enter talks, which are likely to take place with senior figures in the party, about new ways to constitute the shadow cabinet, with some of his supporters wanting Labour members to be handed a say. The Guardian understands that the mediated discussions are likely to involve the leader and his office, the party’s chief whip, Rosie Winterton, the parliamentary Labour party’s chairman, John Cryer, and Watson.
Corbyn and his supporters refused to sign up to a proposed motion for a Saturday deadline for the discussions in order to have an agreement in place by the time the outcome of the leadership contest is decided.
The NEC will, however, expect to be updated on the progress that day during a meeting at the party’s conference in Liverpool scheduled to take place after the result has been announced.
Jonathan Ashworth, a shadow cabinet minister and NEC member, told the Guardian that it had been a “very good meeting” adding: “It is clear that everybody wants to find a way forward and the agreement to start negotiations around an elected shadow cabinet would be a welcome first step to bring about unity and allow an effective frontbench to take on the Tories,” he said.
But another person who attended the meeting said it was now down to goodwill as the NEC hadn’t actually come to any formal agreement and had voted against talks with a deadline. “As the motion was not passed Jeremy could legitimately refuse to engage in any further discussions on the issue – although he indicated there still might be talks,” they said. “So it still remains to be seen whether it will come back to the NEC on Saturday or be kicked into the long grass.”
Allies of Corbyn are reluctant to be pushed into a deal that they fear could leave him “imprisoned” within his own shadow cabinet but are also aware of the need for a plan to bring the party back together after Saturday’s vote.
A source close to the leader told the Guardian that Corbyn was ready for talks as a means of “trying to bring the PLP and Labour party leadership back together” but said that he would not be rushed. Instead of an agreement by Saturday night, when the group meets again, he suggested a special NEC away day in a month or so to pin down the plans.
The NEC did agree to have two new members with full voting rights from the Scottish and Welsh executives. In a vote that was passed by 16 to 14, they said those individuals would be frontbenchers, which one insider said was “controversial” because that could tip the finely balanced make-up of the executive away from Corbyn supporters.
Sources said the party leader was wrongly seen as having abstained in the vote that will allow Labour’s leader in Scotland, Kezia Dugdale – who has been critical of Corbyn – to join the committee as a full member. Instead Corbyn opposes the idea, the sources said, because he believes members ought to vote to appoint the NEC.
The leader’s campaign team held a “super Tuesday” exercise in which his supporters used a smartphone app that allowed them to call hundreds of members each in order to try to persuade them to back Corbyn in the final hours before Wednesday’s voting deadline.
Meanwhile, Owen Smith – Corbyn’s challenger and a former shadow welfare secretary – wrote an open letter to Labour party members and supporters about what he called a “long and bruising contest” that he admitted many had not wanted. “Our party is at a crossroads and the choice we face is between renewing our party to pursue unity and power, or satisfying ourselves with ongoing division and opposition. It’s the clearest choice we have had to face in a generation. A choice that will not just determine the future of our party, but the future of the millions of people in Britain who need Labour in power,” he wrote.
Smith argued that he saw what the Tories did to the country in the 1980s and said he felt it was happening again with a “hard right agenda … Throughout this campaign I have been deeply humbled by the support and backing I have received from people and organisations across our movement: GMB, Usdaw, Community Union, the Musicians’ Union, the Socialist Health Association, Jewish Labour Movement, Labour Movement for Europe, hundreds of volunteers and more than 1,000 councillors,” he said, adding that whatever the outcome he would go on making arguments about health, investment, austerity, inequality and Brexit.
Corbyn’s team accused Smith and his allies of talking Labour down by arguing that the current leader was unelectable and said it was unacceptable to inflict that type of damage on the party. One spokesman said: “What surprised me in the last few days is that we have not had any calls for unity from Owen Smith. Normally at this stage – if you think you are going to win, you say that people should respect the outcome and work together.”
