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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Politics
Andrew Sparrow

Corbyn heading for clash with Labour members by calling for Brexit decision to be postponed – as it happened

Day two of the Labour conference takes place in Brighton

Evening summary

  • Jeremy Corbyn is facing a clash with party members tomorrow over his plan to postpone a vote on what stance the party should adopt in a referendum on Brexit until after the general election. The party’s national executive committee has approved a motion saying this decision must “only” be taken after the proposed Brexit renegotiation. See 4.40pm. But surveys suggest the Labour membership is overwhelming in favour of remain, and at least 80 motions have been submitted saying the party should commit to remain now. Delegates will debate this decision tomorrow afternoon, but whether the conference ends up taking a firm decision, or settling on a compromise, may depend on the wording of the composite motion that is being drafted in a private meeting this evening.
  • Delegates have voted for a motion that theoretically commits the party to getting rid of private schools. (See 6.25pm.) Other motions passed by the conference, under new procedures intended to give delegates more say over policy (see 5.52pm), include ending NHS outsourcing and making the provision of all social care free. (See 7.02pm.)

That’s all from me for tonight.

Thanks for the comments.

From the Mirror’s Pippa Crerar

This is from my colleague Rajeev Syal.

@labourlewis is Clive Lewis.

What Labour conference voted for today

As promised a bit earlier, here is a summary of the five composite motions and one women’s conference motion passed by delegates earlier. (See 5.15pm.) All were passed overwhelmingly on a show of hands.

1) Schools composite 1

This effectively commits the party to abolishing private schools. See 6.25pm.

2) Schools composite 2

This says Labour should stop the opening of any new academies and free schools and bring all publicly funded schools back under the control of local authority education committees.

3) NHS composite 1

This says Labour should provide “the necessary additional resources to cover rising costs in the NHS and social care” and “end all privatisation and outsourcing in the NHS”.

4) NHS composite 2

This says Labour should end all NHS outsourcing and return all outsourced services and staff to the NHS.

5) Social care composite

This says Labour should “make the provision of all social care free to [the] recipient as is the case for health care under the NHS”.

Women’s conference motion on migrant women

This says Labour should end the detention of asylum seeking women, put a 28-day limit on all immigration detention and end charges for migrant and refugee women needing ante-natal and maternity care.

Andrew Marr has replied to Jeremy Corbyn. (See 6.06pm.)

Private schools say Labour's plan to abolish them would breach ECHR

The Independent Schools Council has said abolishing private schools would be an attack on parental freedom. (See 6.25pm.) Its chief executive, Julie Robinson, said:

Parents across the country have every right to be worried about the decision by Labour party conference to support a motion to abolish independent schools. The move is an attack on the rights and freedoms of parents to make choices over the education of their children.

Abolition would represent an act of national self-harm. Tearing down excellent schools does not improve our education system. The repercussions would be irreversible and far-reaching, damaging educational opportunities and limiting life chances. Moreover, Labour’s plan would breach the European convention on human rights on the right to choose education.

Momentum says Labour is now committed to abolishing private schools

Of the five composite motions passed this afternoon, the most important is schools composite 1. (See 11.26am). Momentum, the pro-Corbyn organisation which by one estimate is backed by around 70% of CLP (constituency Labour party) delegates at the conference and which promoted schools composite 1, has just put out a news released headed: “Labour commits to abolishing private schools in next manifesto.” Laura Parker, Momentum’s national coordinator, said:

This is a huge step forward in dismantling the privilege of a tiny, Eton educated elite who are running our country into the ground. Every child deserves a world class education, not only those who are able pay for it, and I’ll be proud to campaign on this manifesto pledge at the next election.

When she was explaining Labour’s policy earlier, Angela Rayner, the shadow education secretary, did not put it quite in these terms. She said Labour was committed the “integration” of private schools into the state sector, which implies a more gradualist and voluntary approach. (See 11.26am.) John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, recently told the Guardian that he wanted an education system “where private schools don’t need to exist and should not exist where we have equality of education” - which is also not quite the same as promising to close Eton against its wishes.

But the text of schools composite 1 does back up the Momentum analysis of what it means. I quoted some of it earlier. For the record, here it is in full. I have used bold text to highlight the most significant sentence.

Conference notes:

Only 7% of UK students attend private schools, yet the Sutton Trust 2019 report revealed that 65% of senior judges, 52% of junior ministers, 44% of news columnists and 16% of university vice-chancellors were educated in private schools.

Children at private schools have 300% more spent on their education than children in state schools.

Participation in private schooling is concentrated at the very top of the family income distribution

A Populus poll revealed 63% of the public agree, “it is unfair that some people get a better education and life chances for their children by paying for a private school.”

Conference believes:

Labour must go further than the 2017 manifesto to challenge the elite privilege of private schools who dominate the top professions.

The on-going existence of private schools is incompatible with Labour’s pledge to promote social justice, not social mobility in education.

Labour is opposed to hierarchy, elitism and selection in education.

Private schools reflect and reinforce class inequality in wider society.

Conference resolves:

To include in the next Labour party general election manifesto a commitment to integrate all private schools into the state sector. This would include, but is not limited to:

Withdrawal of charitable status and all other public subsidies and tax privileges, including business rate exemption.

Ensure universities admit the same proportion of private school students as in the wider population (currently 7%)

Endowments, investments and properties held by private schools to be redistributed democratically and fairly across the country’s educational institutions.

Laura Parker
Laura Parker Photograph: Momentum / @JDCmoore

Corbyn criticises Marr Show for not asking Raab about Boris Johnson allegations

Jeremy Corbyn has criticised the BBC for not giving enough attention to newspaper allegations that Boris Johnson failed to declare potential conflicts of interest while London mayor. Referring to a story broken by the Sunday Times saying Johnson allegedly failed to declare an interest in the allocation of public money to a close friend, Corbyn said:

There was something important in one of the Sunday papers today about an alleged abuse of power and misuse of public funds by Boris Johnson before he became prime minister. But, do you know what? Lots of the media have barely touched it. Incredible, isn’t it? This is about the man who is the prime minister of our country.

Referring to his appearance on the Andrew Marr Show this morning, Corbyn said:

I was on the BBC’s flagship news programme this morning and I was asked about a range of issues. That’s fine. It’s right. It’s justified. It’s how our democracy works.

But I was followed by Boris Johnson’s deputy [Dominic Raab], who was asked nothing about these allegations.

This is how the establishment works. They close ranks. They put privilege first.

Things have to change.

Labour will put people first before privilege.

Jeremy Corbyn visiting a union radio stall at the Labour conference.
Jeremy Corbyn visiting a union radio stall at the Labour conference. Photograph: Sean Smith/The Guardian

Updated

In the conference hall the “reference back” votes are still going ahead. The row a moment ago (see 5.15pm) was about a procedural point that was barely comprehensible. But the broader story is clear, and quite interesting; members are complaining that they are not having as much influence over policy as they want.

In their recent book on party political membership, Footsoldiers, the academics Tim Bale, Paul Webb and Monica Poletti reveal that in 2017 Labour members were more likely than members of any other main party (the Tories, the Lib Dems, the SNP, Greens and Ukip) to say that they should have more influence over party policy. At one level this was surprising because Tory members have almost zero influence over party policy, and Labour members have some influence. But the kind of people who join Labour expect to have a say over party policy, and when Jeremy Corbyn was elected leader he promised to give more power to the membership. Bale, Webb and Poletti write:

The figures for the 2017 survey suggest, however, that [Corbyn] was not widely felt to have delivered on this promise during his first two years as leader - an impression only strengthened by subsequent developments: by 2019, there were unmistakeable signs of growing discontent among an overwhelmingly anti-Brexit membership of the way Jeremy Corbyn was dealing with this issue.

This analysis does not take account the fact that this year the conference schedule has been changed to ensure that members do have more of a say in the past. As Luke Akehurst explains in this LabourList briefing, this year 20 priority ballot motions are being debated, not the usual four. That is a significant change. But, judging by some of the things being said on the floor of the conference, some members are not satisfied.

Another delegate in the conference hall has just complained about the size of the union vote. “There is no point us voting here because everything we vote for just gets voted down,” she said. “Why don’t you just stay here and we can go to the pub?” she added in exasperation.

Updated

Labour would reverse all cuts to legal aid advice, says Burgon

In his speech to the party conference Richard Burgon, the shadow justice secretary, said that a Labour government would reverse all the Tory cuts to legal aid-funded early legal help within 100 days of coming to power. Here is an extract from a Labour news release with more details.

Early legal help is the legal support that people receive prior to a lawyer representing them in the courts. It is the kind of advice that many desperately need when faced everyday problems such as flawed benefits decisions or rogue landlords.

Access to justice has been seriously undermined by the Tory and Liberal Democrats changes to legal aid, with hundreds of thousands of people unable to enforce their rights.

In addition to Labour’s previous commitments to restore this form of legal aid for housing cases, family law and welfare benefits appeals, this move will restore legal aid cuts for immigration cases, employment, debt, and mental health cases.

A lack of early legal advice often creates extra costs for the taxpayer as cases go to court which could have been resolved earlier or spiral into costly social problems as people unnecessarily lose their homes or jobs.

The United Nations special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights has said that cuts in legal aid meant many could no longer afford “to challenge benefit denials or reductions and are thus effectively deprived of their human right to a remedy.”

Richard Burgon.
Richard Burgon. Photograph: Gareth Fuller/PA

In the conference hall delegates have voted to pass five composite motions, plus a motion from the women’s conference. All were carried overwhelmingly. I will summarise what they say shortly.

They are now voting on some “reference back” proposals relating to policy commission reports. This is the process went wrong before lunch. (See 1.16pm.) There have been more complaints about the process not being clear, but this time the votes are going ahead. But one delegate complained about the voting system being unfair. The trade unions control almost half the votes at Labour conference. The delegate said this meant ordinary members kept getting defeated by the union vote. It should be one member, one vote, he said.

According to ITV’s Robert Peston, some members of Labour’s national executive committee are saying that the Brexit policy statement that the NEC is supposed to have agreed (see 4.40pm) has not actually been agreed by the committee.

Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary, has been speaking to the Guardian editor-in-chief, Katharine Viner, at a fringe event. Here are some of the highlights from my colleague Frances Perraudin.

Updated

Corbyn heading for clash with members by calling for Brexit decision to be postponed

The Mirror’s Dan Bloom has the text of the Brexit motion being proposed by Labour’s national executive committee.

The wording is much the same as the draft circulating yesterday, but there are two changes. The new version adds references to the Good Friday agreement and to the rights of EU nationals to the paragraph about the Brexit deal a Labour government would seek to negotiate.

And the final paragraph now says:

The NEC believes it is right that the party shall only decide how to campaign in such a referendum - through a one-day special conference, following the election of a Labour government.

What’s new about this is the addition of the word “only”, which was not in yesterday’s text. It has the effect of firming up the message.

This means the leadership is heading for a clash with Labour remainers like Emily Thornberry, who want the matter settled now. (See 4.12pm.)

Thornberry says Labour should reject proposal to postpone Brexit decision

Emily Thornberry, the shadow foreign secretary, has renewed her call for Labour to decide this week whether or not it will back remain in a future referendum. Firming up what she said in a Guardian interview last week, she told a HuffPost fringe meeting:

We’re all here [at conference]. I don’t see why we can’t make the decision now ... I think that this conference should thrash it out.

As the draft statement from Labour’s national executive committee shows, Jeremy Corbyn’s current plan is for a Labour government to negotiate a new Brexit deal within three months of coming to power and to hold a referendum within six months of coming to power. The party would decide at a one-day special conference after the renegotiation how it would campaign in the referendum.

The issue is due to be decided tomorrow. The conference will be asked to back the NEC statement, but many delegates will be pushing for a move to commit the party to backing remain in all circumstances. At least 80 motions have been submitted making this argument, and a meeting will take place tonight to roll these up into a composite.

In her speech to the conference Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary, said Tory policies were to blame for rising crime. She said:

There is no question that the cuts in police numbers have contributed to the rise in crime. But other contributors are the cuts to education, the increase in school exclusions, all the zero-hours contracts, all the homelessness and inequality. All the cuts in mental health services have also played their part.

And these are all Tory policies. When they say they will lead the fight against crime – do not believe a word of it. They are the ones who have created the conditions for rising serious and violent crime. Senior police officers are increasingly going on record and saying that cuts to public services have created an environment where crime flourishes. Cuts have consequences. You cannot keep people safe on the cheap.

And she ended by saying Jeremy Corbyn would lead a “great, reforming government”. She explained:

We will welcome refugees, including child refugees.

We will proudly uphold the torture ban and treat the victims of torture with humanity, not detentions and deportations.

We will end indefinite immigration detention, and limit it to the 28 days MPs were originally promised.

And we will close Yarl’s Wood and Brook House detention centres and review the entire detention estate.

We will fund our police forces properly, and work to give our communities genuine security.

We will hold public inquiries into historic injustices – into Orgreave, into blacklisting.

We will release all papers relating to the Shrewsbury 24 trials and the 37 Cammell Laird shipyard workers.

I owe everything in life to the Labour movement. There was a postwar generation of socialists who campaigned against colonialism. There was the NHS orange juice and cod-liver oil. There was my free university education. And above all the chance to serve as Britain’s first black woman MP.

Diane Abbott speaking at the conference.
Diane Abbott speaking at the conference. Photograph: Michael Mayhew/Sportsphoto Ltd/Allstar

Updated

Speaking at a fringe meeting about how Labour can win back support in its heartlands, Jon Trickett – shadow Cabinet Office minister and MP for Hemsworth – said he was fed up with the argument that the people who voted for Brexit were from “backwards” communities in the north of England. He said:

Here’s the point I want to make. Those held-back communities – the heartland communities – can be found in Hastings, they can be found in Hackney and they can be found in Hartlepool.

A very senior member of the Labour party, she said to me: ‘Well, no wonder they’re all coming down south, the young people, because you can’t be gay up north.’ That was said by somebody whose name you will have mentioned several times in the past few weeks.

He later said:

Those people who are suggesting that the people who voted for Brexit did not know what they were voting for infantilises 17 million people.

Updated

Jeremy Corbyn at the Unite stall at the Labour conference.
Jeremy Corbyn at the Unite stall at the Labour conference. Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA

Updated

Labour would halt local hospital closures pending reviews covering social impact, Ashworth says

In his speech to the conference this morning Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, said a Labour government would halt hospital closures pending reviews looking at clinical evidence and social impact. He said:

Local hospitals and health centres are part of the fabric of society.

They are valued local employers. Often where our children are born, or where we finally say goodbye to our loved ones.

Shut services down and something invaluable vanishes from a community.

Of course, nothing stays the same. Medicine advances. Treatments evolve. New facilities are built. I think we all understand that.

But we need more capacity, not less.

So I can tell you cuts and closures because of Boris Johnson’s austerity will be halted, suspended and decisions reviewed based on clinical evidence and social impact instead.

Jonathan Ashworth speaking to the Labour conference.
Jonathan Ashworth speaking to the Labour conference. Photograph: Anthony Harvey/Rex/Shutterstock

Updated

This is from Kay Boycott, the chief executive of Asthma UK, welcoming Labour’s announcement today that it would end prescription charges in England.

We have been campaigning hard for years to stop the unfair prescription charges for people with asthma that are putting them at risk of having a life-threatening asthma attack, so it is hugely heartening that our concerns have been heard and the Labour party has now committed to scrapping prescription charges for everyone in England.

An estimated 1.3 million people with asthma have cut back on their medication because of the cost, which puts them at risk of a potentially life-threatening asthma attack. Hundreds of nurses have seen their patients have asthma attacks or need emergency treatment because they can’t afford to pay their prescriptions.

This is unacceptable and unfair. No one should have to pay to breathe.

Updated

Labour should be 'unequivocally pro-remain', says Sadiq Khan

Sadiq Khan, the Labour mayor of London, told a fringe meeting at lunchtime that he also wanted the party to adopt an unequivocally pro-remain stance. He told the New Statesman event:

We are at a vital crossroads. Neutrality is not an option. The party should be unequivocally pro-remain. All Labour MPs should be whipped to campaign for remain.

Updated

For a more colourful insight into what Len McCluskey probably thinks about Labour remainers, it is worth reading The Fall and Rise of the British Left, a new book by Andrew Murray, the chief of staff at McCluskey’s Unite union, and a part-time adviser to Jeremy Corbyn. Murray writes:

Brexit Derangement Syndrome, a fever which has long prostrated the Conservative party, now runs riot on the left and has the potential to destroy the broad-based alliance for progressive social change assembled under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of Labour. Were it to become a full-on ‘remain’ party, as many politicians and pundits want, setting aside the decision of the 2016 referendum, it would endanger decisive layers of time-honoured support now regarded as out of joint with the new enlightenment. It would be a Hilary Clinton strategy in short.

There are plenty of other reasons why it’s worth reading Murray’s book. It doesn’t contain any Corbyn office gossip, but it is well-written, sometimes funny and probably the best guide currently available to the ideology at the heart of Corbynism.

Updated

In his Sky News interview, the Unite general secretary, Len McCluskey, also denied being involved in the attempt on Friday night to get Labour’s national executive committee to abolish the post of deputy leader. As PoliticsHome reports, McCluskey said the claim that he was involved (he and Watson are bitter enemies now, having once been friends) was “fake news”.

Updated

Shadow cabinet ministers should quit if they won't back Corbyn's Brexit stance, says McCluskey

Len McCluskey, the Unite general secretary, has also been calling for unity this morning. But, unlike his fellow union leader Dave Prentis, whose call for unity was broadly supportive of Tom Watson (see 12.58pm), McCluskey said that if members of the shadow cabinet like Watson were not willing to back Jeremy Corbyn’s line on Brexit, they should resign.

Speaking on Sky’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday, when asked if he had a message for senior Labour figures who were arguing that the party should commit to campaigning for remain in any second referendum on Brexit, he replied:

My message is to support the leader …

We must go into an election united. And when we have a policy on Brexit, and Jeremy Corbyn makes it clear that that is the policy, then that’s what leading members of the shadow cabinet should argue for. If they find that they can’t argue for it because they feel strongly, well of course they have that right, but they should step aside, and step aside from the shadow cabinet, which will become the cabinet, and they can argue whatever they want.

But the policy and my appeals to them, and to Emily [Thornberry, shadow foreign secretary] and to anybody else is, support your leader …

If we get to a position where Jeremy is saying: ‘Let’s not make our decision on how we will campaign until we know what the deal [is],’ my appeal to her – support Jeremy and that’s my appeal to the whole of conference.

Asked if that meant he was unhappy with people saying the party should commit now to backing remain in any future referendum, McCluskey said he was if these people were “in the leadership”. He explained:

In this situation … in order for Labour to get through the message of unity and healing our nation, everybody needs to be singing from the same hymn sheet. Now if the leadership team – the shadow cabinet, soon to be the cabinet – find that difficult then yes they should step aside.

A reminder: among those people who have been saying today that Labour should commit now to backing remain in a second referendum come what may are: Tom Watson, the deputy leader (see 12.39pm), Richard Leonard, the Scottish Labour leader (see 12.16pm), and Mark Drakeford, the Welsh Labour leader and Welsh first minister (see 11.47pm).

Updated

The morning session in the conference hall has just ended. Delegates were supposed to have a series of votes – including on the private schools composite (see 11.26am) – but the votes had to be abandoned after a few minutes of chaos. The chair, Andi Fox, called a vote on a proposal to “reference back” part of the early years policy commission report. But two delegates used points of order to complain that they did not know exactly what bit they were referencing back, the chair was unable to explain, and after an outbreak of angry shouting from the hall she announced that all the votes would be put off until the afternoon.

Updated

Unison boss Dave Prentis tells Labour conference infighting is 'road to nowhere'

In the debate on health and social care Dave Prentis, the general secretary of Unison, urged Labour to unite, in an implicit criticism of the attempt to abolish the post of deputy Labour leader. He told the conference:

We all know, in our heart of hearts, that to save the NHS there is only one option: Labour has to win power. Divided parties never get elected. So we owe it to our NHS to leave Britain this week united … What members need like never before is a Labour government. So less of the triggering, less of the denouncing, less of the deleting – that is the road to nowhere. Let’s get behind our leader, Jeremy, let’s get out there, get the NHS back in our hands, and our great party back in power.

Prentis went slightly further in a tweet on this subject yesterday.

Updated

And this is from my colleague Rajeev Syal, who has been at Tom Watson’s fringe event.

Updated

These are from the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg.

Tom Watson, the deputy Labour leader, has been speaking at a lunchtime fringe meeting. According to extracts from his speech sent out in advance, he repeated his call for Labour to commit to backing remain in any second referendum. He said:

This week we have the opportunity to unite the Labour party around a position we believe in.

Jeremy Corbyn has been right to try to bring the country – both leave and remain voters – back together. Offering everyone in the country the final say is the best way to begin bridging this divide.

The vast majority of our members, our MPs and our voters want to remain in Europe. If we achieve a people’s vote, I believe our members, our MPs and our party will lead the campaign to remain. That’s not just because it is the best way of reconnecting with our voters, but also because it is the best way of standing up for our values.

We are a remain party. We are a European party. We are an internationalist party. That is who we are. Not perfect, not pure. But overwhelmingly committed to Britain remaining in Europe and reforming Europe.

By backing a people’s vote, by backing remain, I am sure we can deliver the Labour government the people of this country so badly need.

Tom Watson
Tom Watson. Photograph: Leon Neal/Getty Images

Updated

Attempts to reinstate a key “socialist” section of Labour’s constitution have been rejected, PA Media reports. A rule change aimed at restoring the original wording of clause IV was pushed by some members at the party’s annual conference in Brighton. Under this clause in Labour’s 1918 constitution, the party was committed to the “common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange”. But one such proposal to reinstate the original wording was defeated by 71.53% to 28.47% while another was rejected by 68.58% to 31.42%. As PA reports, both secured a majority of support among votes cast by constituency Labour parties but more than 99% of votes from affiliates – which include trade unions – opposed the change.

The votes were held yesterday, but because there were card votes, the results were only announced this morning.

Updated

Leonard says he cannot see case for holding second Scottish independence referendum 'in foreseeable future'

And this is what Richard Leonard, the Scottish Labour leader, said on the BBC’s Sunday Politics Scotland about whether Labour should back a second independence referendum in Scotland. The Scottish Labour party has in the past firmly opposed the idea, but in August Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, said a Labour government in London would not object to such a poll being held. Subsequently Leonard and Corbyn agreed a compromise line.

Explaining the position today, Leonard said:

The Labour position going into the general election whenever it comes will be that we oppose the creation of a separate Scottish state, that we oppose independence and therefore that we oppose the holding of a second independence referendum.

Where there has been some discussion is around if there was to be a renewed mandate which showed not only electoral but demonstrable public support for the holding of a second referendum – then there would need to be some consideration given to that.

We had an independence referendum just five years ago and that’s got to be a factor in considering whether the circumstances are right for a second independence referendum to be held.

All of the evidence shows that even people who voted yes in 2014, even some people who are supporting the SNP, do not think that the time is now for a second independence referendum.

The circumstances under which the 2014 referendum were held were that the SNP had gained an overall majority – unprecedented, completely unexpected – and there was an understanding that there had never been an independence referendum and the time might be right to test it.

What I’m saying is I don’t see the circumstances today and I don’t see them in the foreseeable future where we would be back in that kind of space again.

Updated

Scottish Labour leader Richard Leonard says UK party should be 'more overtly remain'

Richard Leonard, the Scottish Labour leader, like his Welsh counterpart Mark Drakeford (see 11.47am) has said Labour should back remain in any future referendum. Speaking on the BBC’s Sunday Politics Scotland, Leonard said:

The Scottish Labour party took a decision frankly in the wake of the European party election results that we needed to be much clearer, that we needed much greater clarity about the position that we were taking.

For that reason the Scottish executive of the Labour party backed my proposal that we call for an affirmative vote that any deal should go back to the public; secondly, that on that vote there should be a remain option; and thirdly, that we would campaign unambiguously for remain.

I would support the party taking that stance. I do think the time has come for clarity on this question and the Scottish Labour party, the Welsh Labour party take a similar view that we should be more overtly remain.

Richard Leonard
Richard Leonard Photograph: Ken Jack/Getty Images

Updated

According to the BBC’s Norman Smith, tomorrow delegates are due to get a vote on two Brexit options – a composite motion saying the party should back remain in all circumstances, and a compromise motion tabled by the national executive committee setting out the leadership’s position.

Here is the text of the NEC motion.

Updated

Mark Drakeford says Welsh government is committed to campaigning for remain

The Welsh Labour party is firmly committed to the UK remaining in the EU in all circumstances, unlike the UK Labour party. That is also the position of the Labour-run Welsh government. This is what Mark Drakeford, the Welsh first minister, told the conference in his speech this morning.

Faced with the deep and lasting damage this hard Tory Brexit will do to our country, we say it’s time to go back to the people in a second referendum with remain on the ballot paper.

And conference, I can tell you now that my Welsh Labour government will continue to stand up for Wales by campaigning wholeheartedly, vigorously and unapologetically, for Wales to remain in the EU.

Brexit has torn at the very fabric of the things we cherish, including the United Kingdom itself.

Those pursuing Brexit have used – and misused – the union for their own narrow and ideological ends.

To drive us away from the partnerships we have developed with our European friends over so many years.

We should be under no doubt that the voluntary union of our four sovereign nations here in the UK is under threat if we do not act.

Updated

Angela Rayner says Labour is committed to 'integration' of private schools into state sector

The Labour conference is debating education at the moment. In her speech, Angela Rayner, the shadow education secretary, said a Labour government would be committed to the “integration” of private schools into the state sector. She told delegates:

That is why we’ll upgrade social mobility to social justice, turning the Social Mobility Commission into the Social Justice Commission. And we will set that commission to work on making the whole education system fairer through the integration of private schools.

John McDonnell and I will set out the further steps a Labour government would take. But I can say today that our very first budget will immediately close the tax loopholes used by elite private schools, and use that money to improve the lives of all children.

Quite what this pledge means in practice is not clear. As Rayner says, Labour wants to take away the tax advantages private schools enjoy, which would make private education more expensive, and perhaps as a result less desirable. But delegates want Labour to go further.

The conference is currently debating two composite motions on schools. One of them – schools composite 1, moved by Battersea CLP – says “the ongoing existence of private schools is incompatible with Labour’s pledge to promote social justice, not social mobility in education”. It goes on:

Conference resolves:

To include in the next Labour party general election manifesto a commitment to integrate all private schools into the state sector. That would include, but is not limited to:

Withdrawal of charitable status and all other public subsidies and tax privileges including business rate exemption.

Ensure universities admit the same proportion of private school pupils as in the wider population (currently 7%).

Endowments, investments and properties held by private schools to be redistributed democratically and fairly across the country’s educational institutions.

Angela Rayner.
Angela Rayner. Photograph: Anthony Harvey/Rex/Shutterstock

Updated

Jeremy Corbyn's interview with Andrew Marr – summary

Here are the main points from Jeremy Corbyn’s interview with Andrew Marr.

  • Corbyn said the UK could be better off outside the EU than within if the right Brexit deal were available. (See 10am.) While recognising that most party members wanted the UK to remain in the EU, Corbyn said it was important to recognise why 17 million people voted to leave. He said:

Please remember why people voted leave, why people voted remain, but also remember there is more that unites all of those people – over austerity, over investment, over education, over housing, over health, over a green industrial revolution – than there is that divides them.

  • He said that if the conference voted for Labour to campaign for remain in all circumstances, he would respect that decision. At the moment his policy is for Labour to offer voters a choice between remain and a credible leave option in a referendum after the election, and for the party to decide its stance at the time. But, when asked if he would agree to campaign for remain regardless if the conference voted for that this week (Brexit is being debated tomorrow), Corbyn replied:

I will go along with whatever decision the party comes to.

  • He did not rule out giving Labour MPs a free vote if Boris Johnson brings a deal back to the Commons. However, he implied this was unlikely. Asked if a free vote was possible, he replied:

I would hope we could vote together as a party on this. And that is what I’ve tried to do all the way through.

  • He said Labour and other opposition parties would use Commons votes to block a further suspension of parliament if the supreme court ruled that the current suspension (prorogation) was unlawful. The court is due to announce its ruling early next week, and Corbyn said there should be an immediate recall of parliament in those circumstances. And he said:

If [the supreme court] decide that parliament should be recalled … then we would seek to take immediate action in parliament to prevent him closing down parliament all the way through to 31 October. So I would work with the other opposition parties, as we have up to now.

Corbyn did not say how opposition parties might stop a second prorogation. It is normally just up to the prime minister to decide when parliament is prorogued.

  • Corbyn said he did not know that his ally Jon Lansman was going to call a vote at Labour’s national executive committee meeting on Friday calling for the post of deputy leader to be abolished. He said he was aware of general talk about changing the role, but not that this motion was going to be proposed. He said:

I was not aware that the particular motion was going to be moved at that time, but I knew there were people discussing options.

Corbyn also claimed the move was not directed against Watson personally. When it was put to him that he should have known what was being planned, he replied:

I’m not all-seeing and all-knowing – I’d love to be.

  • Corbyn dismisses concerns about the operation of his office raised by his policy adviser Andrew Fisher in a private memo about his decision to resign. When asked why the memo referred to colleagues having a “lack of human decency” and a issuing a “blizzard of lies”, Corbyn confirmed that he had read the document. He went on:

I think [Fisher] said that because he was extremely distressed at that point about whatever was going on in discussions within the office at that moment. I would have thought similar memos fly around the BBC pretty much every day.

Corbyn also stressed that Fisher would stay in his job until the end of the year and said he had had a “very convivial” coffee with Fisher and other members of his team only this morning. He went on:

He is a great colleague, a great friend … I’ve worked with Andrew for 15 years, when I was a backbencher and many other times. He is a great writer, he’s a great thinker and he’s done a huge amount of work in the party. We get along absolutely very well and he’s promised that whatever happens in the future he will be working with me on policy issues.

  • Corbyn rejected suggestions that he might be about to step down. He said he would lead the party into the general election and serve a full term as PM if he won. (There were claims that the move to oust Tom Watson was prompted by fears that Corbyn might be close to resigning, which would raise the prospect of Watson taking over as interim leader.)
  • Corbyn defended Labour’s decision, announced today, to commit to abolishing Ofsted. Asked why he was doing this, Corbyn replied:

Because it is a very assertive form of investigation into a school. They turn up every few years, or sometimes more frequently than that, and do an exercise on that school and then make a decision about it. The level of stress on the students and the teachers is absolutely enormous.

What we want instead is a more frequent form of supportive investigation of schools and examination of them through HMI, Her Majesty’s Inspectors of schools, but also through local authorities. It’s part of reinvigorating local education authorities to administer all schools within that community area.

  • He said that if he became PM he would try to fly less than his predecessors and use trains more. “I fly as little as I can now,” he said. “I take trains wherever I can.” Promising to do the same in government, he said “an example has to be set”.
Jeremy Corbyn (right) on the the Andrew Marr Show.
Jeremy Corbyn (right) on the the Andrew Marr Show. Photograph: Handout/BBC via Getty Images

Updated

Corbyn says UK could be better off outside EU if right deal available

Here is the full exchange with Andrew Marr where Jeremy Corbyn said the UK could be better off outside the EU than inside in some circumstances.

AM: One of your first jobs [as PM] is go to Brussels and negotiate a new Brexit deal … In that context, is it your view that Britain is better off inside the European Union or better off, long-term, outside the European Union? Which?

JC: [It] depends on the agreement you have with the European Union outside.

AM: So we could be better off outside, therefore?

JC: Listen, what I’ve tried to do all along is recognise the result of the referendum and respect it. That’s what we said in our 2017 manifests, which is why we voted before that to invoke article 50 … We have consistently put forward what I believe to be a credible option, which is what we call the five pillars which is the customs union, the trade relationship, protection of consumer, environmental and workers’ rights, and of course, the Good Friday agreement and the peace process …

I recognise the majority of Labour party supporters and members support remain and supported remain, but a significant minority voted the other way.

Updated

Q: Why do you want to abolish Ofsted?

Corbyn says inspections are causing too much stresss.

And that’s it. The interview is over.

I will post a summary and reaction as soon as possible.

Q: If you become PM, will you fly less than normal PMs?

Corbyn says he flies as little as he can. He will take trains as often as he can.

He says he wants to set an example.

  • Corbyn says he would try to travel by train where possible as PM.

Corbyn says he and other opposition parties may try to stop Johnson suspending parliament again

Corbyn says, if the supreme court decides prorogation was unlawful, he and other opposition parties would try to ensure Johnson cannot prorogue again.

He says the Commons should be recalled if that is what the supreme court decides. He hopes that happens.

  • Corbyn says he and other opposition parties may try to stop Johnson suspending parliament again.

Q: You could avoid no deal by voting for a deal Boris Johnson brings back. Do you agree?

Corbyn says Johnson has not brought a deal back. He has been PM since July, but we have not seen one.

Q: Should Labour back a deal?

It depends what it is, says Corbyn.

But he says all his instincts are telling him to that Johnson does not want a deal.

Q: Would you allow Labour MPs a free vote on any Johnson deal?

Corbyn says he would hope that the party would be able to have a united line on this (ie, that he would not allow one).

  • Corbyn does not rule out giving Labour MPs a free vote on any Boris Johnson Brexit deal.

Updated

Q: If the conference votes for Labour to be unequivocally a remain party, will you accept it?

Corbyn says he will accept what the party decides.

But he wants people to remember the concerns of the 17 million people who voted to leave, he says.

Updated

Q: Are you ignoring the views of those who want a “clean-break Brexit”?

Corbyn says the views of these people do matter to him.

But people were not told the truth about what Brexit would involve.

He says the government has tried to hide the truth about what Brexit would involve.

Corbyn suggests UK could be better off outside EU than within it if right deal available

Q: Do you think the UK would be better off staying in the EU or outside?

Corbyn says it would depend on what the deal to leave would be like.

  • Corbyn suggests UK could be better off outside the EU than within it.

He says it is important to recognise that the country voted to leave.

Q: So if Michel Barnier gives you the Labour version of Brexit, would you campaign enthusiastically for it?

Corbyn says he wants to be able to put a sensible leave deal to the public.

Q: So if you get a good Brexit deal, do you then campaign for it?

Corbyn says:

Let’s see what we get, and we will put that final deal to the British people.

Q: Why can’t you answer?

Because we don’t know if we have got it yet, says Corbyn.

Q: So at the moment you are staying neutral?

Corbyn says Labour would have a special conference to decide.

Updated

Corbyn says he would serve a full term as prime minister if elected

Q: Will you definitely be Labour leader during the election and afterwards?

Corbyn says he will be taking the party into the election as leader.

Q: And would you serve a full term?

Yes, says Corbyn.

  • Corbyn says he would serve a full term as prime minister.

Q: Do you recognise the words in the memo from Andrew Fisher, leaked to the Sunday Times?

Corbyn says he has read the memo and discussed it with Fisher.

He says Fisher is doing a stressful job. He wants to spend more time with his family.

But Fisher is here at the conference. They had a discussion this morning.

Q: Why did he talk about a “blizzard of lies” in the office?

Fisher says that might have been because of what happened in the office that day. He says office disagreements happen everywhere. He suggests there might be similar memos about what happens on the Marr show.

Fisher will continue to advise him on policy, he says.

  • Corbyn plays down Andrew Fisher’s concerns about how Corbyn’s office is run, suggesting these are just normal workplace disputes.

Q: If you did not know about this, why not?

Corbyn says:

I am not all-seeing and all-knowing … I would like to be.

Updated

Jeremy Corbyn's interview with Andrew Marr

Jeremy Corbyn is being interviewed by Andrew Marr now.

Asked if he knew in advance about the move to abolish Tom Watson’s post, Corbyn says he did not know a motion was going to be put to the national executive committee. But he knew that there had been talk about changing the role, he says.

Q: Two of your allies, Diane Abbott and Rebecca Long-Bailey, voted to get rid of Watson’s post at that NEC meeting. Have you spoken to them about it?

Corbyn says this move did not work.

  • Corbyn says he did not know in advance about move to get NEC to vote to abolish Tom Watson’s post.

Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, also told Sky News that he did not know if Jeremy Corbyn knew in advance about the attempt on Friday night by Jon Lansman, the Momentum founder, to get the national executive committee to abolish Tom Watson’s post.

Updated

Andrew Fisher, Jeremy Corbyn’s policy chief, has been tweeting this morning about the plan to abolish prescription charges in England. Fisher has not said anything on his Twitter feed about his decision to resign, or the reasons for it.

Here is an extract from the Sunday Times’s inside story (paywall) about the Labour conference and the reasons for Fisher’s resignation.

In his resignation note to allies, Fisher claimed that “class war” had gripped the upper echelons of the party. Insiders say this is a reference to the dominance of Corbyn’s most senior aide, Seumas Milne, and his sidekick James Schneider, both of whom were educated at Winchester and Oxford, over party planning, messaging, Brexit and the election campaign. Andrew Murray – a former communist with aristocratic forebears, who wielded great influence – has only recently taken a step back because he is unwell.

Last week Milne selected the strapline “people before privilege”, a move that led one Labour staffer to remark: “That proves irony is dead – two people with privilege came up with that.”

Fisher also accused Corbyn’s senior aides of having “connived” to leak policies designed to be made public at conference and then lied to him about it.

And he revealed that a speech he was working on and a pamphlet he had signed off were pulled at the last minute without explanation and that a confidential document he was working on was left on a printer for anyone to read.

Updated

On Sky Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, is being interviewed now.

He says his plan to abolish prescription charges in England would cost around £745m. He says the party will explain how it will fund this when it publishes its manifesto costings at the next election.

In Scotland and Wales there are no prescription charges, he says.

Updated

Jeremy Corbyn mugs on sale at the Labour conference.
Jeremy Corbyn mugs on sale at the Labour conference. Photograph: Michael Mayhew/Sportsphoto Ltd./Allstar

Here is our version of the story about the resignation of Andrew Fisher, Jeremy Corbyn’s chief policy adviser.

This is from Tim Shipman, who broke the story in the Sunday Times.

These are from Shipman defending his scoop.

And here is the New Statesman’s Stephen Bush on the story.

Conference agenda

Here are the timings of the main events in the conference hall.

9.50am: Report from Harry Donaldson, chair of the conference arrangements committee.

10am: Mark Drakeford, the Welsh first minister, speaks.

10.10am: Angela Rayner, the shadow education secretary, speaks in a debate on education.

11.20am: Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, and Mark Serwotka, the general secretary of the PCS union, speak in a debate on health and social care.

2.15pm: Diane Abbott, the shadow home secretary, and Richard Burgon, the shadow justice secretary, speaking in a debate on justice and home affairs.

Updated

Corbyn calls for party to have two deputy leaders

It’s the first full day of Labour conference, but already it feels as if there has been enough news to fill the whole week. On Friday night there was the surprise attempt to abolish the post of deputy leader. By lunchtime yesterday the plot had been abandoned, but it was a stark reminder of how deep divisions are in the party, partly over Brexit but also over Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership. The row has distracted attention from the fact that this is also a policy-rich conference, with Labour announcing a cache of policies likely to feature in the forthcoming general election.

Here are the main stories around this morning.

  • Corbyn has told the Sunday Mirror that he would like Labour to have two deputy leaders. Referring to the failed attempt to abolish Tom Watson’s post, and the way he defused it at a meeting of Labour’s national executive committee yesterday, Corbyn said:

I told the national executive we need to review how the deputy leadership works and have an election process for two deputy leaders in the future which reflects diversity within our society so one would be a woman. It was agreed overwhelmingly.

Last year Labour was expected to vote to create a second deputy leader’s post but the plan was unexpectedly shelved at the last minute – reportedly because the leadership feared that the election for the second deputy leader would turn into a proxy ballot on Corbyn’s Brexit policy, with members electing a candidate strongly backing a second referendum (which at the time Corbyn was resisting).

  • Corbyn has played down his differences with Watson, telling the Sunday Mirror that disagreements on policy are inevitable in a shadow cabinet. Corbyn said:

I’ve got a shadow cabinet with great energy. Diane Abbott says she disagrees with me three times a day but totally supports my leadership. When you have people who are very politically committed there are bound to be debates.

Sending people to prison for a few weeks is often the worst way to tackle the drug addictions, mental health and debt problems that lead to people to commit certain crimes in the first place. The Ministry of Justice’s own evidence shows there would be tens of thousands fewer crimes if ineffective short prison sentences were scrapped.

For some offenders – including those who have committed rape, murder and other violent or sexual offences – prison will always be necessary. But jailing others for a few weeks in a prison system in crisis reduces the chances of rehabilitation, making reoffending more likely. Yet thousands of people are being jailed each year for shoplifting and figures I recently uncovered show nearly half of all women sent to prison were homeless.

Instead of the Tories investing scarce justice resources in new prison places that just repeats the errors of the past, we will invest in effective alternatives that keep people safe.

  • Labour has said Boris Johnson must explain newspaper allegations that he failed to declare potential conflicts of interest while London mayor in relation to the allocation of public money to an American woman. As the Press Association reports, the Sunday Times reports the potential conflicts arose through Johnson’s association with the model-turned-technology-entrepreneur Jennifer Arcuri, who moved to London seven years ago. The paper says Arcuri was given £126,000 in public money and was afforded privileged access to three foreign trade missions Johnson led. Jon Trickett, Labour’s shadow Cabinet Office minister, said Johnson should provide full disclosure on the allegations. Trickett said:

Boris Johnson must now give a full account of his actions in response to these grave and most serious allegations of the misuse use of public money in his former role as mayor of London.

The public has a right to know how and why these funds were used for the benefit of a close personal friend without on the face of it legitimate reason.

This cannot be swept under the carpet. It is a matter of the integrity of the man now leading our country, who appears to believe he can get away with anything.

Here is the agenda for the day.

8.30am: The Unite leader, Len McCluskey, is among the guests on Sky’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday.

9am: Jeremy Corbyn is interviewed on the Andrew Marr Show.

9.45am: The conference opens. Those speaking during the day include the Welsh first minister, Mark Drakeford, the shadow education secretary, Angela Rayner, the shadow health secretary, Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow home secretary, Diane Abbott, and the shadow justice secretary, Richard Burgon.

As usual, I will be covering breaking political news as it happens, as well as bringing you the best reaction, comment and analysis from the web, although I will focusing almost exclusively on the Labour conference. I plan to publish a summary when I wrap up.

You can read all the latest Guardian politics articles here.

If you want to follow me or contact me on Twitter, I’m on @AndrewSparrow.

I try to monitor the comments below the line (BTL) but it is impossible to read them all. If you have a direct question, do include “Andrew” in it somewhere and I’m more likely to find it. I do try to answer questions, and if they are of general interest, I will post the question and reply above the line (ATL), although I can’t promise to do this for everyone.

If you want to attract my attention quickly, it is probably better to use Twitter.

Updated

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