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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Politics
Andrew Sparrow

Labour conference decides to duck debate on Trident - Politics live

Jeremy Corbyn (left) and Tom Watson on the platform at the Labour conference
Jeremy Corbyn (left) and Tom Watson on the platform at the Labour conference Photograph: Justin Tallis/AFP/Getty Images

Early evening summary

  • Corbyn has said the government should be working for a UN security council resolution on Syria. As well as proposing increased humanitarian aid and peace talks, the resolution should cover “effective action to end the threat from [Islamic State], the creation of safe zones in Syria to shelter those who have had to flee their homes [and] the referral of suspected war crimes to the international criminal court”, Labour said. In a statement just released Corbyn said:

The situation in Syria is desperate with half the population displaced from their homes and 200,000 dead. Hilary [Benn] and I are at one in agreeing that what matters now is a broad and comprehensive plan as the foundation for a political solution to the conflict and a new United Nations Security Council resolution.

  • Chris Bryant, the shadow leader of the Commons, has criticised Labour politicians in the past for being too obsessed with following the party’s “line”. He praised Corbyn for being different.

People are sick and tired of that kind of command and control, winner takes it all politics. They see out of touch, self-important ministers, parroting the line as if their life depends on it and they cry out for something better.

And the truth is, we got caught up in that too. Not thinking what do I believe, or what is the right thing to do, but what is the line. Voters hate that. They think it’s dishonest and they can smell it through the TV.

That’s why Jeremy won. Genuine, authentic, respectful.

And that’s why we must change as a party. We must speak our mind, speak from the heart.

In a powerful speech he also said the party should take inspiration from the movie Pride and ensure that its different factions unite.

Our task is to write a better future for this party and this country, but we can only do that as a strong, broad alliance. I think of it as a bit like Pride the movie, in which the Lesbian and Gays Support the Miners group turn up in the Welsh Valleys. An unlikely alliance, but it worked. So Len, join up with Tony. Harriet with Peter. Liz with Jeremy. Yvette with Andy.

Because there is pride in a union. Pride in the union of the workers by hand and by brain. Pride in all parts of our party working together. Pride in middle class and working class and yes, the filthy rich, all campaigning together. Pride in the union of our four home nations. Pride in Britain taking a lead in the European Union.

That’s all from me for today.

Thanks for the comments.

Updated

The GMB union has welcomed the conference’s decision not to debate Trident. This is from a spokesman.

The Labour party went before the electorate with a commitment to renew Trident, and that remains party policy. We are pleased there is no threat to the tens of thousands of workers in the defence sector.

Trident decision - Snap analysis

Trident decision - Snap analysis: Many newspapers have been gunning for Jeremy Corbyn since his election and tonight’s Trident decision may well provoke easy headlines about how Corbyn has suffered a humiliating/embarrassing defeat etc. To what extent would they be justified?

First, it is worth pointing out that those in favour of Labour’s existing, pro-Trident policy (see 5.25pm) are much happier than those opposed (see 5.22pm). That is slightly surprising because, even if there had been a debate, the pro-Trident faction would probably have won. But clearly some of those involved decided it was safest not to risk it. Given that Jeremy Corbyn does want to eventually shift Labour policy on this, it is fair to see this as a setback.

The priorities ballot result also rather undermines some of what Corbyn was saying on the Andrew Marr show (very enthusiastically endorsed by Lord Falconer on the World at One) about how he is going to open up and democratise the Labour policy making process. The Trident stitch-up suggests that this may be harder than he thinks and that, in the Labour party at least, the old politics is alive and well.

That said, Corbyn never said he planned to change party policy on Trident at the party conference. He conceded in his Marr interview this morning that this would be a tricky issue for the party, and he must have wondered whether it would be worth having a vote that could have led to a proper defeat. If the conference had debated a motion and then voted clearly in favour of Trident, Corbyn really would have suffered an humiliating blow. Instead this decision just postpones the moment when the party is going to have to resolve the dilemma.

So, overall, this episode does illuminate to a key Corbyn vulnerability (his party does not support him on a key defence issue). But it is not an in-your-face defeat and it does have the advantage of sweeping this issue off the agenda for the rest of the conference.

UPDATE: My colleague Nicholas Watt reports that Corbyn’s deputy chief of staff, Anneliese Midgley, had lobbied members of the conference arrangements committee (CAC) to include the Trident motion under the headline “Britain’s Defence Capability” on their priorities ballot for contemporary motions that are debated at conference. His story is here.

Updated

Jeremy Corbyn has put out a statement about the results of the priorities ballot.

This is an open and democratic party and the members at conference have decided to discuss the issues that they want to debate this week. These are important issues like the NHS, the refugee crisis, mental health and housing.

This is from the Mail’s Tom McTague.

But John Woodcock, one of the most pro-Trident Labour MPs (he represents Barrow and Furness, where nuclear submarines are built), has welcomed the decision.

CND has said it it “very disappointing” that there will not be a debate on Trident.

Results of the ballot to decide what contemporary motions get debated

We have now had had the figures. They confirm that the unions were very firmly opposed to debating Trident, but the constituency Labour parties were not particularly enthusiastic either.

At Labour conference unions have half the votes, and CLPs have half the votes.

Here are the topics the CLPs chose for debate - ranked in order. I’ve left out the raw voting figures, but have included the percentages.

Housing - 18.1%

NHS - 15.93%

Refugees - 15.87%

Austerity - 11.38%

Employment rights - 8.2%

Mental health - 7.83%

Defence (ie Trident) - 7.10%

Social security - 5.61%

Europe - 5.25%

Rail - 2.62%

Syria - 1.6%

Licence fee - 0.76%

And here are the figures the unions chose - with percentages again.

Austerity - 24.9%

Employment rights - 24.75%

Europe - 24.68%

Rail - 15%

Licence fee - 9.77%

Refugees - 0.35%

Defence - 0.16%

Mental health - 0.14%

Housing - 0.10%

Social security - 0.01%

Syria 0%

The eight topics that will get debated are: Austerity, employment rights, Europe, housing, the licence fee, mental health, the NHS and the refugee crisis.

We are now getting the formal announcement about the priorities ballot - ie, the decision not to debate Trident.

Chris Bryant, the shadow leader of the Commons, has just finished addressing the conference. He gave a terrific speech - by far the best of the day. I will post some highlights soon.

Here’s the BBC’s Andrew Neil on the Trident decision.

Sky News’s Faisal Islam claims Jeremy Corbyn would have liked a debate on Trident.

Updated

Here is more on the decision taken (in the form of a ballot on topics selected for debate) not to discuss Trident at the conference. These are tweets from journalists.

Updated

Labour conference to shelve expected debate on Trident, sources say

There won’t be a debate on Trident, sources are reporting. That’s because it has not been selected as a topic for debate in the contemporary motion priorities ballot.

You have to feel for Ian Murray, and wonder what this year’s Labour conference must be like for the only Labour MP left in Scotland. The unlikely shadow secretary of state for Scotland addressed this head-on when he introduced himself to conference rather disarmingly just now as “First time speaker, last man standing, the independent socialist republic of Edinburgh South”.

Though he may have gone a bit too far by adding that he’d rather be watching the rugby.

Otherwise, his message was fairly familiar, and prefigured the following speech by Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale. At one point Murray borrowed from Robert Burns to criticise the SNP: “They claim to campaign like lions. But they govern like mice: sleekit, cowrin, tim’rous beasties!”

(We’ll see how the Nats respond to his quotation of a poet they like to have sole ownership of.)

Meanwhile, Dugdale vowed: “I will hold the mirror up to our government in Scotland and keep on asking: surely this is not the best we can be?” as well as assuring conference that “the days of listening and not acting [in Scotland] are over”.

Both of them made clear, supportive remarks about Jeremy Corbyn, who plans to make his first visit to Scotland since his election next week and whose stance on Trident - a touchstone issue for the Scottish electorate - only one of them (Murray) agrees with.
Dugdale’s Tony Blair reference - she proudly referenced the man himself when she said that Scottish Labour now had more supporters and members than 1997 - didn’t seem to go down too well in the hall.

She is of course right when she insists that Scotland needs a strong opposition, and one detail that may have got lost in the rhetoric about “finding new talented people from all backgrounds to become members of the Scottish Parliament” is an important one. Given that a key criticism of Scottish Labour has been the way talent has drained to Westminster in the past, the party doesn’t have long to ready this new generation for Holyrood 2016.

Kezia Dugdale
Kezia Dugdale Photograph: Facundo Arrizabalaga/EPA

Updated

Carwyn Jones, the first minister of Wales, is the most senior Labour figure holding executive office in the UK. In his speech to the conference he insisted that Labour had a record of achievement in Wales.

Next year the Tories will, of course, out-spend us and will use their Westminster megaphone to once again trash the record of the Welsh NHS.

And there’s danger on the fringes too – the frantic nationalism of UKIP and fantastical nationalism of Plaid Cymru will be competing hard for the votes of the disaffected.

It will be tough.

But, as Welsh Labour, we have a secret weapon. A record of delivery.

Every promise we made, we’ve delivered.

• Thanks to Welsh Labour, Welsh students don’t pay £9000 tuition fees.

• On average, Welsh students are spared £18,000 of debt compared to their English counterparts.

• We said we’d keep the Welsh NHS free from privatisation – free from the internal market – and Welsh Labour delivered.

• For the first time ever – a living wage for all our NHS staff.

• Free prescriptions – delivered.

• Cancer waiting times better than England.

• Free bus passes for elderly and disabled people – delivered

• Disabled Remploy workers supported into jobs after the Tories closed the factories.

• Jobs for 17,000 young people through our Jobs Growth Wales programme.

• I am glad that the new Labour leadership want to focus on housing – in Wales we have exceeded our target for new homes built.

Conference, Because we want every school to be a great school, we said no to the competitive madness of Free Schools.

And because we want every school be a great school, last year we created a new programme to boost attainment in our most challenged secondaries.

The result? The best ever GCSE results for those students. The best GCSE results ever in Wales – achieved without academies or free schools.

He also dismissed the claim that Jeremy Corbyn was unelectable.

There’s been a lot of guff, quite frankly, written about Labour’s commitment to winning future elections following Jeremy’s win.

Let me tell you, as someone who has won a leadership election and an Assembly election – anyone who wins nearly 60 per cent of the vote can’t be anything but serious about winning elections.

Carwyn Jones
Carwyn Jones Photograph: Dimitris Legakis/D Legakis/Athena Picture Agency

At his fringe meeting earlier Chuka Umunna, the former shadow business secretary, also said that Labour should be more willing to speak about immigration.

Immigration clearly has been an issue that our movement hasn’t felt terribly comfortable talking about. Actually, I don’t think we should have an inhibition about talking about immigration at all.

Some recent migrants from Somalia, Eritrea and Eastern Europe were “living parallel lives” and not mixing with local communities, he said.

My view is that integration is a two-way street. Both the settled, existing population and newcomers have a responsibility. I do think it is crazy that we do have first generation immigrants in our country who have been here for 20 or 30 years who can’t speak English.

Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary, has lost his seat on the national executive committee, the Telegraph’s Christopher Hope reports.

Hope says Benn, who was appointed to the NEC as a frontbench representative and who did not sit there as an elected NEC member, has been replaced by Rebecca Long-Bailey, one of the MPs who nominated Jeremy Corbyn for the leadership. Benn’s friends say he only expected to serve on the NEC on a temporary basis while Harriet Harman was acting leader.

My colleague Frances Perraudin has more detail about what Chuka Umunna said about the prospect of having a free vote on Trident. (See 2.45pm.)

Former business secretary Chuka Umunna, speaking at a fringe meeting hosted by Demos, was asked about the prospect of having free votes on the issue of Trident and intervention in Syria.

“I think at the moment, we are fresh out of a leadership election, we are not long from a general election where we went down to one of our worst defeats,” he said.

“I’m all for debate but, ultimately, we are going to have to have settled positions on things if people are to know what it is they are voting for.

“We have got elections in the offing in May, very important elections, and we are going to have many more rounds before the general election. If people don’t know what the position of the Labour party is then we are not going to look like a party of government.”

Umunna added: “I just don’t think it is sustainable for us to free vote everything and, frankly, it’s not sustainable for different people in our leadership to be saying different things.”

Chuka Umunna
Chuka Umunna Photograph: Anthony Devlin/PA

Predictably, in the light of the allegation in the Ashcroft biography of David Cameron, there have been some pig jokes at the conference this afternoon.

In a speech paying tribute to Harriet Harman Angela Eagle, the shadow business secretary, opted for a simple jibe about Cameron’s “penchant for pork”. As Sky’s Jon Craig says, this may have been personal.

In her speech Gloria de Piero, the shadow minister for young people, opted for a rather more elaborate joke. It started rather well, and made a nice contrast, but ended with a punchline implicitly comparing Tom Watson to a pig, which seems a bit harsh. Understandably, no one laughed.

Here it is.

It’s fair to say David Cameron and I had different starts in life.

Apparently, he was sipping champagne on Concorde aged 11. My family were on benefits and I ate free school meals.

But we did have some things in common.

Both of us joined youth societies.

He joined the Bullingdon Club. I joined Labour Students.

The Bullingdon Club met at weekends to go shooting. Labour Students met at weekends to campaign in key seats.

They’d stay up until the small hours at the Tory black and white ball. We’d stay up all night at Labour conference ..... compositing.

They had some ... interesting initiation ceremonies … but I had to share a flat with Tom Watson.

Prescott says Labour women who refused shadow cabinet jobs should stop 'moaning' about women's representation

Earlier I quoted Lisa Nandy and Caroline Flint joining Harriet Harman in complaining about the lack of women in top positions in the party. (See 12.50pm.)

But on the Sunday Politics Lord Prescott complained about senior women in the party “moaning” about this when they refused to take posts in Jeremy Corbyn’s shadow cabinet.

I think that’s their right, of course, [not to serve in the shadow cabinet] but then don’t complain if the cabinet’s not of your own making. I mean, we’ve just seen that with Harriet, about five or six of their leading women refused to stand, and then complained about the make up of the cabinet. Look, that’s just not on. It’s each individual’s right to do that but don’t criticise a cabinet when it’s made up from 45% of the women members in the PLP and more women than men in his cabinet. So why the hell are you moaning?

Prescott also said that Corbyn did not have to worry about having to kneel before the Queen when joining the privy council. You don’t do that, Prescott said; you hop.

When I was first asked to join the Privy Council by John Major I said I didn’t want to do it, he said why? Cos you have to kneel and kiss her hand. I didn’t want to do that, I thought it was a stupid arrangement, I still think it should go. But you don’t do that. you hop. Get into hopping. You hop from one chair to another and brush your lips lightly across her hand.

I’ve taken the quotes from PoliticsHome.

Lord Prescott (left)
Lord Prescott (left) Photograph: Jonathan Brady/PA

Updated

This is from my colleague Patrick Wintour.

More on the possible Trident vote.

Sky’s Faisal Islam says some union figures think they can defeat any proposal to scrap Trident.

And the BBC’s Norman Smith thinks we might get a fudge.

Chuka Umunna, the former shadow business secretary and a leadership candidate for about three days, was speaking at a Demos fringe at lunchtime. Like Lord Falconer (see 2.16pm), he also expressed doubts about using a free vote to try to resolve the Trident dilemma.

And here are some of the other points he made.

Another popular fringe featured Alan Johnson, the former home secretary and now head of the Labour for Europe campaign.

Updated

Len McCluskey, the Unite general secretary, was speaking at a separate lunchtime fringe.

McCluskey has also confirmed that Unite will vote for Trident.

Updated

Labour First, a group on the Labour right who organise a slate of candidates for internal elections, held a fringe meeting at lunchtime. It was packed.

The speakers included Liam Byrne, Rachel Reeves, Yvette Cooper and Tom Watson.

Updated

Lord Falconer casts doubt on wisdom of having a free vote on Trident

Lord Falconer, the shadow justice secretary, is one of the members of the shadow cabinet who agrees least with Jeremy Corbyn. In a recent interview, Falconer (Tony Blair’s former flatmate), merrily listed the many areas on which they disagree.

So it was quite surprising to hear him on the World at One lavishing praise on Corbyn. He said that Corbyn was encouraging the party to have a proper debate about policy, and that that was a good thing. He also said that everything Corbyn said in his Marr interview was consistent with what he said during the election campaign, and that he was bringing “an energy and freshness to politics”. He said the public “fed up with zipped up politicians speaking to an agreed script, not indulging in a debate in which policy is properly formulated”.

But Falconer also hinted that he favoured a debate on Trident in part, at least, because he thought the unilateralists would lose. Asked if Corbyn would every persuaude him to back getting rid of Trident, he replied: “I think it unlikely, to be honest.”

He said that a conference vote against Trident would not necessarily settle the matter within the party.

I don’t think that the vote on Trident will necessary be the [determining factor] as to what Labour policy is, because there’s got to be a proper policy making process, and Angela Eagle has announced that we are going to look into how we do it.

He suggested that he thought some sort of compromise might be possible.

I believe that it will be possible in the debate for positions to be reached which the party can coalesce around ... I very strongly endorse and welcome having a debate, and my views being put to the test and either accepted or rejected by the party.

But he also cast doubt on whether having a free vote on Trident was ultimately a good idea. Asked if he agreed with what Corbyn said on Marr about it being possible for there to be two views on this, he replied:

I think it’s possible. I think there may be some issues where two views are possible. One has got to look at the thing in the round at the end of the day. Ultimately the party has got to have a policy on the economy and its got to have an overall policy on foreign affairs. Whether or not it’s possible to have a free vote on bits and pieces of that, I’m not sure ... We need ultimately as a political party to put a prospectus to the British people in elections.

Lord Falconer
Lord Falconer Photograph: AIecsandra Raluca Dragoi/Commissioned for The Guardian

Updated

In his Andrew Marr interview Jeremy Corbyn criticised the SNP. He told Marr:

Yes [the SNP] have an austerity badge, but where is the economic strategy behind it which doesn’t either continue the austerity that is happening now, or if they go for fiscal devolution is going to be even worse in Scotland because of the price of oil at the present time?

If you are poor in Glasgow or you are poor in Birmingham - you are poor. If you need a house in Glasgow or you need a house in London - you need a house, and so there is the class politics issue of it. That is the message I am taking when I am campaigning in Scotland just as much as I am campaigning anywhere else. Flags don’t build houses.

Stewart Hosie, the SNP’s deputy leader, later hit back on Sky.

I think the issue is, do the Labour party leadership in London yet understand what drives the passions for political change in Scotland, and I suspect they don’t, because many of the lines that Mr Corbyn used in his interview on television this morning were the same old lines we have heard for years. I am just not sure that they really get Scotland yet in the way that they really ought to.

On the Sunday Politics this morning Chris Leslie, the former shadow chancellor, said he thought his successor, John McDonnell, should “tone down” some of his anti-business “aggressive rhetoric”.

I have issues I don’t agree with John McDonnell on, and I would make a plea to John McDonnell and the rest of the new frontbench treasury team, there are certain things we have to do in order to persuade the public that we can be elected again. I think we have got to tone down some of the aggressive rhetoric, for example about sequestering assets without compensation, I don’t think threats of capital controls and boycotting business events, even at Labour party conferences, are the right way to go.

Asked if he thought McDonnell would make a good chancellor, he replied:

I think that’s for the public to decide. I think the election is now four and a half years away. Let’s see if they can convince the general public to get elected.

One of the traditional fixtures of Labour conference is a football match between Labour MPs and lobby journalists on the Sunday. There was no Ed Balls in the team today, but Stephen Kinnock was playing.

Stephen Kinnock (left)
Stephen Kinnock (left) Photograph: Luke Macgregor/Reuters

As was Sadiq Khan.

Sadiq Khan (right)
Sadiq Khan (right) Photograph: Jonathan Brady/PA

Labour launched review of national policy forum to make it 'more inclusive'

In her speech to the conference this morning Angela Eagle, the shadow business secretary and chair of Labour’s national policy forum, announced that the party was going to review the way the NPF works, with a view to making it “more inclusive, open and democratic”. Here’s the key extract.

The national policy forum needs to evolve so we can make it even better.

We need to preserve the best of it, members getting involved and shaping our policy, but look again at what we can do to take it forwards.

So I am today announcing that the NEC [national executive committee] has agreed to hold a review of how we make policy as a party to make it more inclusive, open and democratic.

We want to hear from our members and supporters what they think works well at present, and what doesn’t work so well.

We need to reform the NPF so that in the coming years it empowers everyone to play a full and active role.

This will include looking at how we harness the opportunities new technology brings us to give our members a much greater say.

I know that working together we can build a bigger, better national policy forum.

Watson says Labour MPs likely to get a free vote on Trident

On the Marr Show Jeremy Corbyn hinted that he would allow a shadow cabinet split on the issue of Trident. In a separate interview a few minutes later Tom Watson, the deputy leader, was more explicit. He confirmed that there was likely to be a free vote. Speaking on Radio 5 Live’s Pienaar’s Politics, he was asked if Labour MPs would get a free vote on this, and he replied:

You saw the interview that Jeremy gave earlier, I think it is likely to be a free vote but the shadow cabinet hasn’t taken that decision yet. It seems to be the way the debate is unfolding, doesn’t it?

Tom Watson (right) with Jeremy Corbyn
Tom Watson (right) with Jeremy Corbyn Photograph: Gareth Fuller/PA

Updated

Jeremy Corbyn earlier today, showing his good taste in Sunday newspaper reading
Jeremy Corbyn earlier today, showing his good taste in Sunday newspaper reading Photograph: Handout/Getty Images

At Labour’s women’s conference yesterday Harriet Harman criticised Jeremy Corbyn for not appointing women to the top jobs in the shadow cabinet. This morning two senior women in the party have backed Harman on this issue.

Lisa Nandy, the new shadow energy secretary, told Sky’s Dermot Murnaghan that she was “uncomfortable’ about the fact that Labour’s leader and deputy leader were both men.

I think we have got something to sort out as a party because we have got a situation now where both our leader and our deputy leader are men, and as a women I feel very uncomfortable about that.

Nandy signalled that she favoured the longstanding proposal from Harman for a rule change ensuring that either the leader or the deputy leader is always a woman.

Caroline Flint, the former shadow energy secretary, also gave an interview to Sky backing Harman.

Look, without taking anything away from Jeremy and Tom [Watson] who won the leadership contest this summer, we haven’t got women in the top jobs in our party. That includes the major offices of state. I think that is a missed opportunity and I think Harriet is 100% right.

Nandy also used the interview to dismiss speculation about her being a future leader. She did not want the job, she said.

I have been an MP for five years and I have literally seen almost all of my colleagues singled out as a future leader of the Labour party. I would just say this to you, I don’t want to be leader of the Labour party, we have just been through a leadership contest where anyone who wanted to stand did. I didn’t. That should tell you everything. I don’t want to be leader of the Labour party I don’t know how I can be any clearer than that.

I’ve taken the quotes from PoliticsHome.

Lisa Nandy
Lisa Nandy Photograph: Sarah Lee for the Guardian

The Labour party has put out a formal press notice about the appointment of six economists to serve on a new economic advisory committee. (See 9.02am.)

The press notice includes this quote from Thomas Piketty.

There is now a brilliant opportunity for the Labour party to construct a fresh and new political economy which will expose austerity for the failure it has been in the UK and Europe.

Thomas Piketty
Thomas Piketty Photograph: Fred Dufour/AFP/Getty Images

On Sky News earlier Dave Prentis, the Unison general secretary, gave an indication as to how Labour could arrive at some sort of compromise over Trident. He said that it was possible to oppose Trident renewal without favouring getting rid of nuclear weapons altogether.

When you’ve got such disarray in our public services, our caring services in crisis, how can we afford to spend £20,000m of taxpayers’ money on replacing Trident? I’m not saying end Trident, I’m not saying nuclear disarmament. We can keep Trident running. We do not need to replace it.

Although it is assumed that the Trident debate will be the most contentious event of the conference, it is not clear that there will be a meaningful vote.

Trident may come up because it is one of the 12 topics chosen for a contemporary motion debate. Eight will be chosen, so it is likely that Trident will come up. We’ll get the result of that ballot at 4.55pm.

But it will then be up to the seven constituency Labour parties that have submitted Trident motions to draw up a “composite” motion. Some of the CLPs are for, and some are against. They could produce a clearly-worded motion, either for or against, forcing the conference to take a firm decision on the issue. But it is also possible that they could produce a non-committal motion, effectively shelving the decision. We won’t find out until the text of the composite is released, and that is not due until tomorrow morning.

The Conservatives have issued a response to Jeremy Corbyn’s interview. This is from Sajid Javid, the business secretary.

The Labour leader confirmed that he would weaken our defences by scrapping our independent nuclear deterrent and that he would damage our economy by putting up taxes on jobs, earnings, investment and people’s homes.

This shows the Labour party are a serious risk to our national security, our economic security and to the security of all working people.

Corbyn's interview on the Andrew Marr Show - Summary

Here are the key news points from Jeremy Corbyn’s interview with Andrew Marr. For an overall assessement, I posted a snap verdict earlier.

  • Corbyn hinted that he would allow the shadow cabinet to split when MPs have to vote on the renewal of Trident. He said that his unilateralist views were well known, and that he hoped to persuade his colleagues to support his position. But, when asked what would happen if the shadow cabinet could not agree on a position before the vote in the Commons on Trident, due next year, he replied:

We are going to come to an accommodation of some sort. There may end up being a difference of opinion. Is it so disastrous that politics has two opinions?

He also admitted that it was not clear who took precedence if the Labour party conference took one view on Trident, and the shadow cabinet took another view. Asked what would happen in these circumstances, he replied:

We’re going to have discuss it and debate it and come to a philosophical solution to it.

  • Corbyn insisted that John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, did not believe in “insurrection”. Asked about comments from McDonnell highlighted by the Sunday Telegraph today, he replied:

John is now our shadow chancellor, John is going to put forward some great economic ideas tomorrow. You will be pleasantly surprised at how radical, how good and effective they are and how much they are going to improve the lives of ordinary people in Britain. Is John in favour of insurrection? No he’s not - it was a colourful use of words and I am sure he would explain that.

Corbyn also defended comments McDonnell made apparently defending Ed Woollard, the student jailed for 32 months for throwing a fire extinguisher off the roof of a building into a crowd during the tuition fees riot in London. Corbyn said:

I think the point John was making is that was at the end of a student demonstration and this person threw a fire extinguisher from a roof - which was a stupid, absolutely wrong thing to do, I think that and I think John does as well. I think the sentence he got was possibly disproportionate to the crime he committed and I think that is the fundamental point about it.

Discussing this in 2011, McDonnell said:

That kid didn’t deserve 36 months (sic). Actually, he’s not the criminal. The real criminals are the ones that are cutting the education services and increasing the fees… We’ve got to encourage the direct action, [in] any form it can possibly take.

  • Corbyn said he wanted to increase the Labour membership to 500,000.

I’m hoping that we can get our membership up to around 500,000 as an immediate target. That surely is a good sign for Labour, but a good sign for politics as a whole. Because, generally speaking, party membership all over Europe has been falling, not rising. We’ve bucked the trend. It’s a British achievement.

In August party membership was 293,000. Since Corbyn’s election another 50,000 people have joined.

  • He said he wanted to cut the bottom rate of income tax.

The bottom rate of income tax I would hope to cut lower if we can to help the very lowest earners. I would want to keep the top rate at 50p, I have no plans to raise it and neither does John [McDonnell].

  • He rejected claims that he was more critical of the British military violence in Northern Ireland than he was of IRA violence. When this was put to him, he replied:

The violence was wrong on all sides and I have said so all along. My whole point was if we are to bring about a peace process, you weren’t going to achieve it by military means.

  • He said he still backed a united Ireland, but stressed that it was “for the Irish people to decide”.
  • He hinted that Labour would come out against extending air strikes to Islamic State in Syria. Asked about this, he said that Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary, would set out the party’s position tomorrow. But he added:

The priority is a political solution. The danger is we end up with a proxy war with Russia and others in Syria on top of an unpleasant and nasty civil war. There’s got to be a political solution as quickly as possible.

  • He said he did not support talking to Islamic State (Isis, or Isil).

My view on Isis is you have to cut off their money, cut off their arms, cut off their oil sales, in order to try and isolate them. You also have got to have a political and a cultural campaign to try and persuade young people there is nothing glamorous or great about what Isis are doing. It’s a perversion of Islam. What Isil are doing is appalling. What’s happening in Syria is also appalling, although the numbers of people killed by Isis and all the other conflicts going on is of a different proportion.

  • He said that, although he did not approve of having a hereditary head of state, he was happy to accept the retention of the monarchy.

I’m not in favour of hereditary systems in politics. We do have a head of state who is hereditary. I guess the majority of people probably go along with that in Britain. That’s fine. Leave it there. No part of my election campaign was about this.

  • He said that Nato and Russia both bore some responsibility for the situation in Ukraine. By expanding eastwards, Nato had provoked Russia, he said. Asked who was to blame, he said it was “a bit of both”.
  • He said he was someone he didn’t “do irritation”.
Jeremy Corbyn on the Andrew Marr Show
Jeremy Corbyn on the Andrew Marr Show Photograph: Handout/Getty Images

Corbyn on Marr - Verdict from the Twitter commentariat

This is what some political journalists are saying about the interview on Twitter. Generally the verdict is very favourable.

From the Spectator’s Isabel Hardman

From the BBC’s Nick Robinson

From the Sun’s Tom Newton Dunn

From Newsnight’s Allegra Stratton

From the New Statesman’s George Eaton

From Huffington Post’s Paul Waugh

From the BBC’s Ross Hawkins

From LabourList’s Conor Pope

From ConservativeHome’s Andrew Gimson

From PoliticsHome’s Kevin Schofield

From the BBC’s Sam Macrory

From Newsnight’s Jess Brammar

From Ian Birrell

Corbyn on Marr - Snap verdict

Corbyn on Marr - Snap verdict: Unassuming reasonableness is an attractive trait, and for the most part that is what we saw from Jeremy Corbyn in his Marr interview. Sunday Telegraph readers who have been warned about the prospect of Labour being in the grip of violent insurrectionists (see 9.32am) may have found this all a bit confusing. One of Tony Benn’s great strengths was that he could make even the most diehard Conservative believe that, on certain issues, he was just talking common sense. Corbyn is not in Benn’s class as a communicator, but Marr tackled him firmly with on many difficult issues, and for the most party he handled them well. His claim that he “doesn’t do irritation” may not stand the test of time (in some media encounters he has very clearly displayed irritation), but today he was calm, sensible and even a little funny. I also detected - for the first time ever, I think - signs of Corbyn reaching out to fabled middle England, as he proudly spoke of his knowledge of the Bible and described increasing the Labour membership as a “British achievement”. So, in sum, it was a success.

I will post more reaction, and a summary, soon.

Q: Would Britain be better off as a republic?

That is for people to decide, he says.

Q: But you are Labour leader?

Corbyn says the issue is democracy, and unelected power, and things like the House of Lords and the royal prerogative.

Q: But at the top is a hereditary system.

Corbyn says he is not in favour of hereditary system. But most people in the UK go along with this. Getting rid of the monarchy was not part of his election campaign, he says

Q: I understand your irritation.

I don’t do irritation, Corbyn says.

Q: Lots of people think you might not be suitable to be prime minister. Are you just John the Baptist, not JC?

Corbyn is very familiar with the Bible. He was brought up with the Bible.

He wants to create a decent society, he says.

And that’s it. The interview is over. I’ll post a summary soon.

Q: Some people in Scotland say they cannot support you because you are a unionist.

Corbyn says the SNP are opposed to austerity. But they are privatising CalMac, and they privatised ScotRail.

Q: If there is another independence referendum, will you stand alongside David Cameron?

No, says Corbyn. He will stand alongside Kezia Dugdale.

Flags don’t build houses, he says.

Q: The IRA blew up the Grand Hotel in Brigton. Do you regret inviting members of Sinn Fein into the Commons just a few weeks later?

Corbyn says he invited people who were former prisoners to discuss the possibility of a political solution. The war was unwinnable by either side. So there had to be a peaceful solution. The British government was reaching out to the IRA too.

The peace process has been a great achievement, he says.

Q: John Major and Tony Blair were taking a neutral stance. But you wanted a united Ireland. You wanted the IRA to win.

Corbyn says he wanted the violence to stop. Remember the supergrass trials. They undermined justice.

Q: You have criticised the state violence more than IRA violence.

Corbyn says he wanted peace.

Q: You spoke to them when things were at their worst.

Isn’t that the best time to speak to them.

Q: If there were a beheading next week, would you speak to Isis?

No, says Corbyn. He thinks they are not interested in a political solution.

What Isis is doing is appalling.

Q: Do you still want to see a united Ireland?

It is for the Irish people to decide, he says. But his own views are on the record.

Updated

Q: Getting money out of companies is going to be harder than you think.

Corbyn says the government is cutting tax credits from the poorest families. Inheritance tax has been cut, giving the richest 60,000 families a big tax break.

He says we should chase down tax havens. Companies operating in the UK should pay tax on what they earn here.

Q: A lot of people will agree with that.

Good, says Corbyn. We are making progress.

Q: What are you plans for tax?

Corbyn says he would like to cut tax for the lowest earners. And he would like the top rate to be 50p in the pound.

Q: What do you think about John McDonnell’s comments about insurrection, and about the student who threw a fire extinguisher from the roof?

Corbyn says what that person did was stupid. But possibly his sentence was disproportionate.

Q: Do you support insurrection or violence on the streets?

No, says Corbyn. He says he believes in change through peaceful means.

Q: What is your message to John McDonnell?

Corbyn says McDonnell is not in favour of insurrection. That was “a colourful use of words”, he says.

Q: Do you think Putin is a threat to world peace?

Corbyn says he is not a supporter of Putin, his human rights agenda or Russian expansionism. Or anyone else’s expansionism, he adds.

Q: Was this caused by Nato provocation?

It was a bit of both, he says. Nato was expanding to the east.

There has to be a political solution.

Q: Should Baltic states stay within the Nato ambit?

Corbyn says they decided to join Nato. Ukraine has not joined Nato.

There must be an agreement to remove troops from other sides near the border, he says.

Q: What is your view on Syria, and bombing Islamic State

Corbyn says Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary, will be addressing this in his speech tomorrow. Corbyn says he believes there has to be a diplomatic solution.

Q: Are you worried about getting involved in a confrontation with Russia?

Corbyn says there is a danger of a proxy war with Russia.

Corbyn hints that he might accept a shadow cabinet split over Trident

Corbyn says policy making was too top-down in the party. In the leadership he opened it up. He issued 12 policy documents, all consultative. People do not appreciate how talented ordinary people are, he says.

He says Jon Trickett is launching consultations on policy areas. They will work with the local parties.

He says he wants to make conference more powerful. Barbara Castle used to call it the people’s parliament.

Q: Will Labour have a clear vote on Trident?

Corbyn says his views are well known. He wants Britain to fulfil its obligations under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. And he wants defence diversification, so that there are good jobs for people who used to work in the nuclear defence industry.

Q: What will happen if the conference votes to scrap Trident?

Corbyn says in some ways it is up to the government, and when they choose to bring this to parliament. He expects a vote in June. Before that, there will be a discussion in shadow cabinet.

We will have to debate this, he says.

He says he hopes to persuade them that fulfilling Britain’s obligations under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty is a good thing.

Q: What will happen?

We will have a discussion, says Corbyn. We may come to different views. Is it so disastrous if that happens.

  • Corbyn hints that he might accept a shadow cabinet split over Trident.

Jeremy Corbyn's Andrew Marr interview

Q: 30 years ago at the Labour conference Neil Kinnock kicked out the Trots. Are they welcome back in again?

Jeremy Corbyn says anyone is welcome, provided they support Labour values.

He says many of the new supporters are young people. Many are older people returning to the party.

Q: Neil Kinnock would not be pleased.

Corbyn says Kinnock is one of his constituents. “We get along fine.”

Q: Will £3 supporters have to pay a full membership to become a full member.

Yes, says Corbyn.

He says he wants to get the membership up to 500,000.

The increase in membership is “a British achievement”.

  • Corbyn says he wants to get the Labour membership up to 500,000.

Here are some more Labour stories in today’s papers that may come up in Jeremy Corbyn’s interview with Andrew Marr.

Jeremy Corbyn is facing his first shadow cabinet resignations in a dramatic row over the radical Left-winger’s plan to scrap Britain’s nuclear weapons ...

At least five shadow cabinet ministers feel so strongly that they will be expected to quit if a key vote at the party’s annual conference in Brighton paves the way for Labour to abandon its support for the weapons. The issue will come to a head today when Labour’s conference committee decides whether to call a vote on abandoning support for replacing Trident. Mr Corbyn – a lifelong campaigner against nuclear weapons - has declared that he wants such a vote at the conference in Brighton this week, and that the result will determine his party’s policy.

However, research by the Telegraph has found that 19 of the 30 members of Mr Corbyn’s new shadow cabinet are supporters of maintaining the submarine-based nuclear missiles and have previously voted to keep the system.

Key members of Jeremy Corbyn’s team have actively supported “insurrection” and rioting against the police, a Telegraph investigation has found ...

[John] McDonnell, who in the past has praised the IRA, was a controversial choice as shadow chancellor but the Telegraph investigation will stoke fears he is far too radical for such a crucial post.

At least three times between 2010 and 2012, he called for “insurrection” to “bring down” the government.

At a Liverpool conference on March 10 2012, he said: “There’s three ways in which we change society. One is through the ballot box, the democratic process and into Parliament. The second is trade union action, industrial action. The third is basically insurrection, but we now call it direct action…

“Don’t expect that change [to society] coming from Parliament…we have an elected dictatorship, so I think we have a democratic right to use whatever means to bring this government down. The real fight now is in our communities, it’s on the picket lines, it’s in the streets.”

And for all this talk of a more inclusive, new and open politics, the signs are already there that the opposite is happening.

A leader walking away from the media in silence and repeatedly dodging questions about his attitude towards the Queen doesn’t suggest more open politics. And gangs of Corbynistas aggressively bullying and attacking anyone who dares to disagree with their hard Left position on social media is hardly inclusive.

This feels less like big tent politics and more like a bizarre cult. Are Corbynistas really focused on getting Labour in government or more concerned with forcing through extreme ideological commitments that ensure we cease to be a real political party?

Labour's '3 pillars for change' under Corbyn

If you are interested in what the Labour party stands for at the moment, the Corbyn agenda, or the 2015 manifesto, or something in between, you really need to read a short statement that the party sent out on Friday afternoon, with little fuss, that explains in broad terms how the party will develop policy from here.

The press notice said these were the “three pillars for change” that will provide the framework for the party under Corbyn. Effectively this is the outline for the new Labour manifesto. Here is the statement in full.

Jeremy Corbyn has the largest direct political mandate of any party leader in British history. There will be many debates about what this means for the changes the party must make in the light of Jeremy Corbyn’s mandate, but the parameters are built on three clear areas for change:

· The economy: a new approach based on growth and investment, rebalancing towards a more productive economy, not cuts and austerity that damage public services and growth;

· Britain’s place in the world: a recognition that our role needs to change - reflecting on the lessons of Iraq, the need for an emphasis on co-operation and conflict resolution;

· Participative politics: the old way of doing politics has alienated the public from the political system and from Labour – we need political reform and a new kind of politics that involves and engages people more directly.

There is widespread agreement that these are the pillars of the huge mandate provided by the leadership election. Differences of opinion will emerge within these parameters, but this provides the framework for change established through Jeremy Corbyn’s mandate. The new leadership at every level will now have to work to achieve the change that party membership and supporters have voted for.

Has a Labour conference ever generated quite so much interest and excitement in living memory? It’s two weeks since Jeremy Corbyn was elected leader, but his victory represented such an upheaval to established political convention that just typing those words still seems a little unreal. Labour members wanted change and, with Corbyn in charge, they have certainly got their wish. The party has embarked on a bold and novel project – hailed as glorious by some in the party, and suicidal by others – and over the next four days we will get our first real chance to assess how it is all going to work out.

More specifically, the conference will help to answer a key question about power, and about who’s in charge. Labour conferences often involve rival factions slugging it out (for years it was Blair v Brown) but usually the leader has the upper hand. Now, though, the picture is more fluid and uncertain than it has been for a generation. Corbyn was elected with an overwhelming mandate on a leftwing policy platform at odds with much of what Labour has said and done over the last 20 years. That gives him considerable clout. But he has little support in the parliamentary party, where MPs can claim a rival mandate founded on the 9m people who voted for the (distinctly non-Corbynite) Labour manifesto. Corbyn appointed a largely mainstream shadow cabinet, most of whose members disagree with him on some key issues, and by the end of his first week he had already made concessions on key issues, notably Europe. Can the Corbyn insurgency and the PLP establishment learn to co-exist? Will they compromise amicably, or feud destructively? We’ll start to see this week.

Here are some of the key developments overnight.

  • Corbyn plans to give the Labour supporters who paid £3 to have a vote in the leadership election as registered supports the chance to get involved in shaping policy, the Sunday Times reports.
  • Michael Dugher, the shadow culture secretary, has warned that he must not allow mandatory reselection of MPs. “If you get into things like mandatory reselection, you are heading down the Whacky Races road,” he told the Sunday Times. “We’ve played this game before and it doesn’t end well. It’s time to stop our punishment beatings.”
  • John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, has announced he is setting up a panel of expert economists to advise the party. The economists, who all oppose the government’s austerity policies, are: Joseph Stiglitz, the Nobel prize winner; Thomas Piketty, author of Capital in the 21st Century, Ann Pettifor, Anastasia Nesvetailova, Simon Wren-Lewis and Mariana Mazzucato.

And here is the agenda for the day.

11am: The conference formally opens, with speeches from Peter Kyle, the Labour MP for Hove and Jim Kennedy, chair of the national executive committee.

11.30am: Session on Rebuilding our Party, with speeches from Iain McNicol, the Labour general secretary, Margaret Beckett, who is leading a review of why Labour lost the election, and Angela Eagle, the shadow business secretary.

2.15pm: Session on Better Politics at Every Level, with speeches from Kate Green, the shadow minister for women and equalities, and Gloria de Piero, the shadow minister for young people, and a tribute to Harriet Harman.

3.30pm: Sessions on Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, including speeches from Kezia Dugdale, the Scottish leader and Carwyn Jones, the first minister of Wales.

4.20pm: Session on New Politics, with a speech from Chris Bryant, the shadow leader of the Commons.

4.55pm: Results of the contemporary motions ballot.

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

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