Well, well, well. It transpires that four MPs suspended by Sir Keir Starmer for rebelling over the two child benefit cap have now had the whip restored by the Labour party. Today’s move comes a fortnight after John McDonnell took to LBC to urge Starmer to row back on the decision, telling journalists that ‘we’ve served our sentence, so I’m hoping we’ll simply have the whip restored’. It is rather amusing, then, that McDonnell is among the three remaining politicians who remain suspended. Awkward…
Rebecca Long-Bailey, Ian Byrne, Richard Burgon and Imran Hussain have been admitted back into the party after spending six months sitting as Independent MPs, according to the Mirror. But in a blow for the onetime shadow chancellor under Jeremy Corbyn, McDonnell has not been so lucky. Left-wingers Apsana Begum and Zarah Sultana are also still suspended, with their exclusion from Labour understood to be under review. Will they be allowed to stand under the party banner at the next general election? At the moment, that remains unclear…
The group of seven MPs were punished for lending their support to a Scottish National party amendment to the King’s Speech, which called for the government to scrap the controversial two-child benefit limit. While the government voted the proposal down, Sir Keir was pulling no punches when it came to his dissenters and immediately suspended all seven rebels the same month Labour won the general election. Ouch.
In response to today’s decision, McDonnell has expressed his disappointment that Begum and Sultana remain excluded from the party, adding that he is ‘relaxed about my own position’ as he is still waiting to find out whether he will be charged after an appearance at a pro-Palestine demonstration. Left-wing group Momentum has taken a more energetic tone, slamming the Labour leadership in a fiery Twitter statement that claims:
The way the leadership is treating those who voted against maintaining the two child benefit cap is vindictive and cruel. What’s worse, it’s a slap in the face to their constituents and to the millions of children living in poverty across Britain. This is just another example of the leadership’s petty authoritarianism in an attempt to stifle dissent.
Ouch. Talk about trouble in paradise…
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