Since Jeremy Corbyn was elected as Labour leader, the party has struggled to put on a united front. In fact, MPs from the moderate section of the party have regularly found themselves at loggerheads with the Corbynistas during meetings of the PLP. Happily the majority of MPs did at least manage to find common ground at one meeting earlier this month, where Steerpike understands Jess Phillips’ call for Corbyn’s old comrade George Galloway — who was expelled from Labour in 2003 — to never be allowed back into the party was met with loud cheers.
So Mr S can’t imagine a disclosure from Galloway over the weekend is likely to prove helpful to ‘Team Corbyn’. In an interview with the Sunday Times, Galloway discusses his bid to be London mayor along with his relationship with Corbyn’s controversial head of comms Seumas Milne. Galloway — who is running for mayor on behalf of his Respect Party, against Labour’s Sadiq Khan — says that Milne is his ‘closest friend’. What’s more, Galloway boasts that he speaks to Milne nearly every day; ‘we have spoken almost daily for 30 years’.
With Galloway’s demand that his expulsion from Labour is rescinded so far unanswered, it may come as a concern to many MPs that the Respect politician is in such close contact with Corbyn’s spin doctor. Given that Maria Eagle had to discover via Twitter last week that Ken Livingstone had been appointed as her co-chair on Labour’s defence review after no-one informed the shadow defence secretary directly, Mr S suspects Milne would be wise to focus on speaking to members of his own party — as opposed to political opponents.
Comments