KEIR Starmer’s long-awaited vision for Labour has been described as “banality after banality” by one of the party’s senior figures.
John McDonnell, who was shadow chancellor under Jeremy Corbyn, mocked The Road Ahead, Sir Keir’s essay for the Fabian Society, at a conference fringe today.
Addressing activists in Brighton, Mr McDonnell said Labour needed to have a sense of “urgency” and provide a “real vision” of what sort of society it wanted.
He added: “I have read the 11,500 words [in Sir Keir’s essay]. We were told it was 14,000 words – so there is 2,500 missing. That must be where the politics was.
“The rest of it is banality after banality. It really is.”
He also claim the Soviet dictator Josep Stalin would be over the moon at the way Labour was suspending delegates over disciplinary issues.
He said: “What I can’t stand is delegates turning up to come and represent their constituencies and being told that they can’t be allowed in because they hadn’t got the email saying they have been suspended. This is insane.
“Joe Stalin would be over the moon about the way we are behaving at the moment.”
Mr McDonnell also blamed the leader undermining announcements on workers’ rights and housing by focussing on internal rules changes about future leadership elections.
He said: “Angela Rayner [Labour’s deputy leader] went out to present this yesterday and to go big on the employment rights issue, which will transform people’s lives, and the first 10 minutes of every interview was talking about constitutional reform of the Labour Party.
“It is almost impossible to cut through and it undermines the whole process.”
At another fringe meeting, Mr Corbyn was heckled by his own brother over the climate crisis.
Piers Corbyn also handed out leaflets containing the conspiracy theory that man-made climate change does not exist.
Mr Corbyn was speaking an event on climate justice when the chair asked for questions from women and people of colour only.
Those at the event said the request prompted shouting from a man in the audience, who was then removed, and Piers Corbyn then accused the event organisers of assault.
It’s all kicking off at this Labour fringe event, where Piers Corbyn has just started heckling his own brother and is being talked down by organisers.
— Tony Diver (@Tony_Diver) September 26, 2021
Another man has just been forcibly ejected screaming about the climate crisis. pic.twitter.com/Lowe9ZJ9UN
In a video posted on Twitter by Daily Telegraph political correspondent Tony Diver, the chair of the event, Camille Barbagallo, can be heard saying: “You need to ask yourself what level of entitlement you think you have over this space. You need to sit down and show some goddamn respect.”
She added: “All right, so we need to carry on comrades, because we have a massive task ahead of us.”
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