Tom Gordon

JACK McConnell has condemned the Labour leadership contest as a “shambles” ahead of an emergency meeting to discuss weeding out alleged infiltrators hostile to the party.

With candidates squabbling over entryism by saboteurs, and staff overwhelmed by paperwork, the former First Minister said the process summed up Labour’s “mess” in general.

“This is a ridiculous situation," Lord McConnell told BBC Newsnight on Friday.

“It seems, I think, in many ways to encapsulate what’s gone with the running of the Labour party over recent years and why we’re in this mess in the first place.”

Under new rules, the electorate for the contest has ballooned to 610,000, with 120,000 people paying £3 to vote as supporters, and 189,000 getting a vote through their union.

Some 3000 people have been rejected for backing other parties, 0.5 per cent of the total.

Despite the small numbers, opponents of frontrunner Jeremy Corbyn claim “thousands” of Tories could be secretly backing the veteran left-winger in order to damage Labour, with Andy Burnham’s campaign chief warning the outcome could be “subject to legal challenge”.

Acting leader Harriet Harman yesterday said the result would be final and insisted officials were “rigorously, robustly and fairly” verifying those trying to vote were genuine supporters.

Corbyn’s rivals are expected to demand tougher vetting at an emergency meeting on Tuesday.

Meanwhile the new deputy leader of Scottish labour, Alex Rowley, yesterday called for a UK-wide referendum on whether to renew the Trident nuclear deterrent.

The call coincided with Nicola Sturgeon signing the “Rethink Trident” statement organised by CND and Compass, calling for a halt to the £100bn replacement plan.

Rowley said there were “question marks over whether it [Trident] is the best way to defend the country” and he had not “seen the case made as to why we would renew” the system.

Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale has signalled her party will debate Trident renewal at its October conference in Perth, but personally favours multilateral over unilateral disarmament.