Steerpike Steerpike

Watch: Emily Thornberry threatens Caroline Flint with legal action

As soon as the exit poll was released on Thursday night, showing that Labour had been decimated in the general election, most people expected that the party would spend the next few months (or longer) tearing itself apart.

Even so, few expected that that its representatives would have begun suing each other so soon after the result. Apparently not though. This morning, Emily Thornberry, the party’s Shadow Foreign Secretary, announced that she was taking legal action against the former MP for Don Valley, Caroline Flint. Flint claimed that Thornberry had said she was glad her constituents weren’t as ‘stupid’ as another MP’s Northern, Brexit supporting voters.

In an interview with Sky News this morning though, Thornberry hit back with an expletive filled interview, saying:

‘As long as it’s true, I take it on the chin. But they can’t make up shit about me and if they do, I have to take it to the courts.’

Before repeating several times that:

‘You can’t go on national television and make up shit.’

Perish the thought of course, that Thornberry could ever have been dismissive of Brexit voters. Only Mr S does seem to remember that Thornberry told a Question Time audience in 2016 that Brexit supporters ‘voted to take their next-door neighbour’s job away’.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UsRHx6Z5W0

Perhaps Thornberry could sue herself over the remarks?

Steerpike
Written by
Steerpike

Steerpike is The Spectator's gossip columnist, serving up the latest tittle tattle from Westminster and beyond. Email tips to steerpike@spectator.co.uk or message @MrSteerpike

Topics in this article

Comments