Unite the union is not terrorising Labour party staff and MPs

Jennie Formby, pictured here with Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and shadow chancellor John McDonnell at the party’s conference in September, writes that Damian McBride is ‘simply slinging around smears in a way that will remind many of his previous reputation for playing fast and loose with the truth’. Photograph: Jonathan Brady/PA

Damian McBride (Like a good Marxist, Corbyn is securing his revolution from within, 20 November) makes an astonishing claim about Unite – and without a shred of evidence to support it. We are left to conclude that the purpose is a malicious one.

Nobody in the Labour party, not least the leader, is “allowing Unite the union to terrorise the party’s staff and MPs” for one very good reason – it is not happening. If Mr McBride has evidence to the contrary, he should present it and allow us to address it.

Absent of any information to support his wild claims, however, Mr McBride is simply slinging around smears in a way that will remind many of his previous reputation for playing fast and loose with the truth.
Jennie Formby
Political director, Unite the union; member of the Labour party’s national executive committee

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