Corbyn

by Richard Seymour

  32In fairness, the prison population had been steadily rising for some time, but the growth very suddenly accelerated from the mid-1990s due to harsher penalties. See ‘Story of the prison population 1993–2012’, Ministry of Justice, March 2013, gov.uk; and Gavin Berman and Aliyah Dar, ‘Prison Population Statistics’, House of Commons, 29 July 2013, parliament.uk.

  33‘Most prisons are overcrowded – Prison Reform Trust’, BBC News, 28 August 2012; Jamie Doward, ‘Fears that Britain’s prisons are at crisis point after growing unrest’, Observer, 28 March 2015

  34Anushka Asthana, ‘New Labour pushed Britain’s beliefs to the right, says academic’, Guardian, 24 January 2010.

  35Patrick Wintour and Vikram Dodd, ‘Blair blames spate of murders on black culture’, Guardian, 12 April 2007.

  36Jack Straw, Interview with Annie Oathen, Radio West Midlands, 22 July 1999; Straw’s defecation comments were reported in Vikram Dodd, ‘Anger after Straw lets fly at travellers as “crooks”’, Guardian, 1 September 1999.

  37Rebecca Omonira-Oyekanmi, ‘UK immigration detention: the truth is out’, Open Democracy, 5 March 2015; ‘Blunkett names ‘Britishness’ chief’, BBC News, 10 September 2002; ‘New UK citizenship testing starts’, BBC News, 1 November 2005; Gaby Hinsliff, ‘Speak English at home, Blunkett tells British Asians’, Guardian, 15 September 2002; Arun Kundnani, The End of Tolerance: Racism in Twenty-First-Century Britain, London: Pluto Press, 2007; David Goodhart, ‘Too diverse?’, Prospect, February 2004.

  38The Cantle report, undertaken in response to the northern riots which pitted largely young Asian men against police and the far Right, blamed the ‘parallel lives’ led by minorities and considered that immigrants should make an oath of national allegiance in future. ‘The Cantle Report – Community Cohesion: a report of the Independent Review Team’, Home Office, January 2001.

  39‘Statistics on Race and the Criminal Justice System – 2004’, Home Office, 2005.

  40Charlotte Denny, ‘Privately financed revolution’, Guardian, 3 October 2002; see Allyson Pollock, NHS Plc: The Privatization of Our Healthcare, London: Verso Books, 2004; Allyson Pollock, ‘The exorbitant cost of PFI is now being cruelly exposed’, Guardian, 26 January 2006.

  41Roy Hattersley, ‘It’s no longer my party’, Observer, 24 June 2001.

  42Even the editorial page of the right-wing London paper the Evening Standard gave its backing to ‘a full-blooded return to nationalisation’. Editorial, ‘The State must step in to save our railways’, Evening Standard, 12 May 2002.

  43Livingstone failed to block the PPP by legal means, but the sheer fiscal inefficiency of the system led to its eventual collapse, as debt-laden companies ended up selling their stake back to Transport for London. ‘Mayor loses bid to block PPP for tube’, Guardian, 30 July 2001; Alexandra Wynne, ‘Why the Tube PPP collapsed’, New Civil Engineer, 20 May 2010.

  44‘US attacks stun TUC’, BBC News, 11 September 2001.

  45‘20,000 join anti-war protest’, Guardian, 13 October 2001.

  46‘Anti-war protests under way’, BBC News, 31 October 2002.

  47On the Observer’s lamentable record of reporting in this period, see Nick Davies, Flat Earth News: An Award-winning Reporter Exposes Falsehood, Distortion and Propaganda in the Global Media, London: Vintage, 2009.

  48‘Anti-war rally makes its mark’, BBC News, 19 February 2003; Euan Ferguson, ‘One million. And still they came’, Observer, 16 February 2003.

  49‘“Unpopularity is the price of leadership”’, Guardian, 17 February 2013.

  50‘Full text: David Blunkett’s speech’, Guardian, 2 October 2003.

  51Nick Cohen, ‘Going nowhere fast’, Observer, 12 October 2003.

  52Benedict Brogan, Toby Helm and George Jones, ‘Union chiefs give Blair bloody nose’, Telegraph, 2 October 2003.

  53John Kampfner, ‘The Warwick watershed’, Guardian, 2 September 2004.

  54Shiv Malik, ‘Occupy London’s anger over police “terrorism” document’, Guardian, 5 December 2011; Daniel Evans, ‘Police cracking down on Bristol rioters and extremists’, Bristol Post, 13 September 2013.

  55John Kampfner, ‘Labour’s steady path to authoritarianism’, Telegraph, 19 October 2007; Paul Lewis, ‘Birmingham stops Muslim CCTV surveillance scheme’, Guardian, 17 June 2010.

  56‘“Remove full veils” urges Straw’, BBC News, 6th October 2006; Jonathan Freedland, ‘If this onslaught was about Jews, I would be looking for my passport’, Guardian, 18 October 2006.

  57Andrew Rawnsley, The End of the Party: The Rise and Fall of New Labour, London: Penguin Books, 2010, pp. 1397–98; ‘In full: Tom Watson’s resignation’, BBC News, 6 September 2006.

  58Toby Helm, ‘Disillusioned Jack Straw plotted against Gordon Brown in bid to take over No. 10’, Observer, 21 February 2010; Decca Aitkenhead, ‘Jack Straw: “I would have done a better job than Gordon Brown”’, Guardian, 31 January 2014.

  59Stephen Nickell, ‘The Assessment: The Economic Record of the Labour Government since 1997’, Oxford Review of Economic Policy, vol. 18, no. 2, 2002; David Coates, Prolonged Labour: The Slow Birth of New Labour, Palgrave Macmillan, 2005, pp. 17–184.

  60Gordon Brown, all too late, acknowledged his role in this. Patrick Wintour and Nicholas Watt, ‘Brown: I should have done more to prevent bank crisis’, Guardian, 17 March 2009.

  61Julie Froud, Michael Moran, Adriana Nilsson, Karel Williams. ‘Wasting a crisis? Democracy and markets in Britain after 2007’, Political Quarterly, vol. 81, no.1, 2010, pp. 25–38

  62Ewald Engelen, Ismail Erturk, Julie Froud, Sukhdev Johal, Adam Leaver, Michael Moran, Adriana Nilsson and Karel Williams, After the Great Complacence: Financial Crisis and the Politics of Reform, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011.

  63Quoted in Jim Pickard, ‘Conservatives: the party of business?’, Financial Times, 3 February 2016; Tim Ross, ‘Michael Gove aims to be the heir to Tony Blair’, Telegraph, 15 May 2013.

  64Simon Lee and Matt Beech, eds., The Conservatives Under David Cameron: Built to Last?, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009, pp. 13 and 21–2; especially Stephen Driver, ‘“Fixing Our Broken Society”: David Cameron’s Post-Thatcherite Social Policy’, in Simon Lee, and Matt Beech, eds., The Conservatives under David Cameron: Built to Last?, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.

  65Jon Cruddas and Jonathan Rutherford, ‘Labour must fashion a new patriotism’, Guardian, 1 July 2011.

  66Don Paskini, ‘Blue Labour founder: “Labour should involve EDL supporters”’, Liberal Conspiracy, 21 April 2011.

  67Dan Hodges, ‘We should all be in the dock on immigration’, Labour Uncut, 19 August 2010.

  68‘Prime Minister’s questions: The Full Story’, BBC News, 9 June 2010.

  69Hélène Mulholland, ‘Labour will make cuts to welfare budget if it wins 2015 election, says Liam Byrne’, Guardian, 2 October 2012.

  70Richard Seymour, ‘Authoritarianism and free-market orthodoxy in Liam Byrne’s welfare ideas’, Guardian, 4 January 2012.

  71Tom Newton Dunn, ‘Prime Minister’s questions: The Full Story’, Sun, 22 April 2011.

  72Rowena Mason, ‘Emily Thornberry resigns from shadow cabinet over Rochester tweet’, Guardian, 20 November 2014.

  73‘Miliband steps up attack on SNP as any post-election deal ruled out’, The Herald, 10 April 2015

  74Andrew Grice, ‘Ed Miliband lost the election because he ditched New Labour, says Tony Blair’, Independent, 10 May 2015.

  75Rowenna Mason, ‘Beckett report: Labour lost election over economy, immigration and benefits’, Guardian, 14 January 2016.

  76Oliver Wright, ‘Miliband shows he’s a control freak too’, Independent, 17 February 2011; Patrick Wintour, ‘Ed Miliband signs up top Obama adviser David Axelrod for UK election’, Guardian, 17 April 2014; Rowenna Davis, ‘Arnie Graf: The man Ed Miliband asked to rebuild Labour’, Guardian, 21 November 2012.

  77Adam Bienkov, ‘Ed Balls wouldn’t reverse anything from Osborne’s Budget’, Politics.co.uk, 19 March 2015.

&nbs
p; 5. Two Years Before the Mast: Corbyn’s Subaltern Leadership

  1Jane Merrick and Mark Leftly, ‘Jeremy Corbyn: Labour MPs are plotting a coup against the potential leader if he is elected’, Independent, 18 July 2015; Christopher Hope, ‘Jeremy Corbyn could face Labour MPs’ coup “within days of being elected leader”’, Telegraph, 20 August 2015; Adam Bienkov, ‘Labour MPs plotting coup against Jeremy Corbyn “on day one”’, Politics.co.uk, 12 August 2015.

  2Tim Ross and Emily Gosden, ‘Jeremy Corbyn faces coup plot if he wins Labour leadership’, Telegraph, 27 July 2015.

  3Alison Little, ‘Lord Mandelson implores Labour to delay coup against Jeremy Corbyn’, Express, 25 September 2015.

  4Heather Stewart and Rowena Mason, ‘Leaked list of “hostile” Labour MPs lays bare party divisions’, Guardian, 23 March 2016; Anushka Asthana, ‘Labour MPs back call for Jeremy Corbyn to stand down’, Guardian, 25 March 2016.

  5Jamie Stern-Weiner, ‘Jeremy Corbyn hasn’t got an “antisemitism problem”. His opponents do’, Open Democracy, 27 April 2016; Baroness Jan Royall, ‘Allegations of anti-Semitism: Oxford University Labour Club’, at www.ousu.org.

  6Jonathan Freedland, ‘Labour and the left have an antisemitism problem’, Guardian, 18 March 2016; anonymous, ‘Labour’s shame’, Jewish Chronicle, 17 March 2016; Daniella Peled, ‘The anti-Semitic clouds gathering over U.K.’s Labour Party’, Ha’aretz, 17 March 2016; Thomas Jones, ‘Labour and antisemitism’, LRB blog, 4 May 2016; Jamie Stern-Weiner, ‘Jeremy Corbyn hasn’t got an “antisemitism problem”. His opponents do’, Open Democracy, 27 April 2016.

  7Howard Jacobson, ‘Corbyn may say he’s not anti-Semitic, but associating with the people he does is its own crime’, Independent, 4 September 2015; Rowena Mason, ‘Jewish Labour MP hits out at Jeremy Corbyn’s record on antisemitism’, Guardian, 14 August 2015.

  8Tom Harris, ‘The Labour Party is increasingly anti-Semitic’, Telegraph, 14 March 2016; Camilla Turner, ‘Labour anti-Semitism row threatens to divide the party’, Telegraph, 6 March 2016; Kate McCann, ‘Jeremy Corbyn must tackle anti-semitism within Labour or face “almighty row”, warns MP’, Telegraph, 13 March 2016; ‘IJV Statement on allegations of antisemitism in the Labour Party’, Independent Jewish Voices, 1 May 2016.

  9The Shami Chakrabarti Report, 30 June 2016, at labour.org.uk; ‘Jewish Labour movement reaction to Chakrabarti inquiry report’, Jewish Labour Movement, 30 June 2016.

  10Geoffrey Evans and Jonathan Mellon, ‘Working class votes and Conservative losses: solving the UKIP puzzle’, LSE blog, 30 April 2015; Chris Curtis, ‘UKIP is a “gateway drug” – but more are going straight for the hard stuff’, YouGov, 5 May 2017.

  11Matt Dathan, ‘EU referendum: 5 ways the launch of the In campaign was a disaster’, Independent, 12 October 2015; Hugo Dixon, ‘Britain stumbles into long EU-referendum campaign’, Financial Times, 16 October 2015; Britain Stronger in Europe, YouTube, 11 October 2015.

  12Ben Riley-Smith and Peter Foster, ‘Rapists and murderers harder to deport if Britain leaves EU, “In” campaign claims’, Telegraph, 12 October 2015.

  13‘Corbyn launches Labour In for Britain campaign battlebus’, Telegraph, 10 May 2016.

  14Rowena Mason, ‘Jeremy Corbyn “not on same side” as David Cameron in EU debate’, Guardian, 29 February 2016.

  15Andrew Sparrow and Claire Phipps, ‘EU referendum live: Gordon Brown compares Leave campaign to Trump’s’, Guardian, 13 June 2016; Angela Phillips, ‘The BBC’s obsession with balance took Labour off-air during the referendum campaign’, LSE blog, 10 August 2016.

  16John McDonnell MP, DiEM 25 – Another Europe Is Possible, London, 28 May 2016.

  17‘Media coverage of the EU referendum (report 5)’, Centre for Research in Communication and Culture, Loughborough University, 27 June 2016; ‘The people hoping to persuade UK to vote to stay in the EU’, BBC News, 13 June 2016; Lucy Fisher, ‘Johnson takes to skies for last stand’, The Times, 22 June 2016; ‘Alan Johnson launches Labour’s “keep UK in the EU” campaign’, BBC, 1 December 2015.

  18Phil Wilson, ‘Corbyn sabotaged Labour’s remain campaign. He must resign’, Guardian, 29 June 2016.

  19Editorial, ‘The culpability of Jeremy Corbyn’, The Economist, 24 June 2016.

  20John Curtice, ‘Where’s the evidence that Jeremy Corbyn is to blame for Brexit?’, New Statesman, 4 July 2016; John Curtice, ‘Don’t blame Jeremy Corbyn – polls show only Tory voters could have kept us in the EU’, New Statesman, 30 June 2016; Anushka Asthana, ‘Labour In for Britain chair criticises Jeremy Corbyn’s campaign involvement’, Guardian, 26 June 2016; Andy McSmith, ‘Brexit: Jeremy Corbyn undermined and sabotaged Remain campaign, claims Peter Mandelson’, Independent, 6 August 2016; Lord Ashcroft, ‘How the United Kingdom voted on Thursday … and why’, Lord Ashcroft Polls, 24 June 2016.

  21Heather Stewart, ‘Ed Miliband calls for Jeremy Corbyn to resign as Labour leader over Brexit’, Guardian, 29 June 2016; ‘Former Labour leader Kinnock urges Corbyn to resign’, BBC, 22 July 2016; Gloria de Piero, ‘If you think the country need new leadership, I am begging you to join our Party and give Labour the champion they need’, Sun, 3 July 2016; Jamie Reed, ‘My letter to @jeremycorbyn tonight’, Twitter.com, 29 June 2016.

  22Robert Peston, ‘Corbyn opponents try to fix vote’, ITV News, 12 July 2016; Julia Rampen, ‘Anti-Corbyn campaigners are recruiting lapsed Labour members – but is it legal?’, New Statesman, 18 July 2016.

  23Anoosh Chakelian, ‘Labour suspends local party meetings to avoid intimidation – will it work?’, New Statesman, 14 July 2016; Aubrey Allegretti, ‘Labour suspends local party meetings to prevent intimidation of MPs and activists’, Huffington Post, 13 July 2016.

  24John McTernan, ‘Why Angela Eagle is exactly what Labour needs’, Telegraph, 29 June 2016; John McTernan, ‘Is change afoot in the British political weather?’, Policy Network, 1 February 2011.

  25Rachel Cooke, ‘Angela and Maria Eagle: “We were brought up to believe that there was nothing we couldn’t do”’, Guardian, 7 February 2016.

  26Mikey Smith, ‘Who is Angela Eagle? All about Jeremy Corbyn’s first challenger and her policies’, Mirror, 10 July 2016.

  27Hilary Benn, ‘Why I’m backing Angela Eagle for Labour leader’, Sun, 17 July 2016; Craig Woodhouse, ‘The Eagle has crash landed’, Sun, 11 July 2016.

  28Gabriel Samuels, ‘Angela Eagle accuses BBC interviewer of pandering to “Corbynista meme” during Iraq War questioning’, Independent, 12 July 2016.

  29Amanda Devil, ‘Vandals target Eagle’, Sun, 12 July 2016.

  30Alexandra Sims, ‘Angela Eagle’s constituency branch issues statement supporting Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader’, Independent, 6 July 2016.

  31Anne Perkins, ‘Angela Eagle was never going to be Labour leader. You can guess why’, Guardian, 19 July 2016.

  32Anoosh Chakelian, ‘“I’ve got a wife and children”: Owen Smith’s Andrea Leadsom moment’, New Statesman, 18 July 2016; Adam Bienkov, ‘Owen Smith says sexist Nicola Sturgeon tweet was “just banter”’, Politics.co.uk, 5 September 2016; Aubrey Allegretti, ‘“29 inches – inner leg measurement of course”’, Huffington Post UK, 30 August 2016.

  33Dan Hodges, ‘Spineless, incoherent, incompetent – and how Owen Smith’s house of cards is collapsing’, Mail on Sunday, 21 August 2016.

  34Heather Stewart, ‘Isis should get round the table with UK, says Owen Smith’, Guardian, 17 August 2016; Anushka Asthana, ‘Owen Smith: Labour leadership more crucial than my NI peace role’, Guardian, 19 September 2016.

  35Mark Chandler, ‘Keep Corbyn protest: defiant leader addresses huge crowds after “catastrophic” meeting with MPs’, Evening Standard, 27 June 2016; Adam Boult, ‘Rally in support of Jeremy Corbyn cancelled due to “overwhelming public demand”’, Telegraph, 29 June 2016; Julia Rampen, ‘Inside the Momentum rally: meet the Jeremy Corbyn supporters challenging Labour’s rebel MPs’, New Statesman, 28 June 2016; Lizzie Dearden, ‘Jeremy Corbyn says he is “proud to carry on” as Labour leade
r in defiant speech amid calls for resignation’, Independent, 29 June 2016; Sarah Pine, ‘Top Unite official to attend Momentum’s “Keep Corbyn” rally tonight’, LabourList, 27 June 2016; Sarah Pine, ‘Momentum set to mobilise thousands to back Corbyn this weekend’, LabourList, 1 July 2016.

  36Ellesmere Port Unite Community, ‘Keep Corbyn rally – Liverpool 2nd July 2016’, YouTube, 2 July 2016.

  37Len McCluskey, general secretary, Unite the union; Dave Prentis, general secretary, Unison; Tim Roache, general secretary, GMB; Dave Ward, general secretary, CWU, Brian Rye, acting general secretary, Ucatt; Manuel Cortes, general secretary, TSSA; Mick Whelan, general secretary, Aslef; Matt Wrack, general secretary, FBU; Ronnie Draper, general secretary, BFAWU; Chris Kitchen, general secretary, NUM, ‘Joint trade union statement on the Labour party’, 29 June 2016, at unitetheunion.org.

  38Robert Fisk, ‘Bad luck Jezza: Jeremy Corbyn has 0% chance of winning majority in the next general election, electoral report says’, Sun, 9 August 2016; Robert Fisk, ‘“Not in my lifetime”: ex-Labour leader Neil Kinnock warns there will not be a Labour government if Jeremy Corbyn is re-elected’, Sun, 18 September 2016.

  39Jonathan Walker, ‘Jess Phillips says she could resign as a Labour MP if Jeremy Corbyn wins’, Birmingham Mail, 20 July 2016.

  40Caroline Mortimer, ‘Rebel Labour MPs “to form new group to force Jeremy Corbyn to resign” if party loses election’, Independent, 9 May 2017.

  41Jon Stone, ‘Labour’s right wing draws up new plan to undermine Jeremy Corbyn’, Independent, 1 June 2017.

  42Kate McCann, ‘Why can’t Labour MPs get rid of Jeremy Corbyn before the June general election?’, Telegraph, 19 April 2017.

  43Graeme Demianyk, ‘Jeremy Corbyn was NOT “dancing a jig” before Remembrance Sunday service’, Huffington Post, 13 November 2016.

  44Jon Craig, ‘Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn denies supporting or meeting IRA’, Sky News, 26 May 2017

  45Andrew Gilligan, ‘Revealed: Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell’s close IRA links’, Telegraph, 10 October 2015; Claire Newell, Hayley Dixon, Luke Heighton, and Harry Yorke, ‘Exclusive: MI5 opened file on Jeremy Corbyn amid concerns over his IRA links’, Telegraph, 19 May 2017; Laura Hughes and Edward Malnick, ‘Revealed: Jeremy Corbyn’s three decades of blocking terror legislation’, Telegraph, 26 May 2017; Richard Dearlove, ‘Corbyn would not be allowed into security services, so he’s not fit for No 10’, Telegraph, 8 June 2017.