A rebellious threat to Labour was tottering on the threshold of disarray as its launch descended into quarrelling.
Zarah Sultana dramatically quit Labour and said she would be ‘co-leading’ a new left-wing party with Jeremy Corbyn.
After losing the whip, the staunchly pro-Palestinian MP, who has long been a critic of Keir Starmer, was already serving as an independent.
But it appears the move caught Mr Corbyn by surprise, with the former Labour leader said to be ‘furious and bewildered’ – although he has yet to respond publicly.
There also seems to be no decision on what the name of the new party would be, with options mooted including ‘Real Change’ and ‘Peace and Justice Project’.
Mr Corbyn has been hinting strongly that he wants to form a new party – with polls suggesting it could entice 10 per cent of the left-wing vote and inflict significant damage on Labour.
In an interview on Wednesday, the 76-year-old claimed there was a ‘thirst’ among voters ‘for an alternative view to be put’.
Mr Corbyn has sat as the independent MP for Islington North since being suspended by Labour in 2020 for downplaying the extent of anti-Semitism in the party under his leadership.
Due to his membership in the Independent Alliance, a loose coalition of independent MPs with left-leaning political beliefs, he was expelled last year but managed to hold onto his seat in the general election.
Posting on X last night, Ms Sultana that she was ‘resigning from the Labour Party’.
She said: ‘Jeremy Corbyn and I will co-lead the founding of a new party, with other independent MPs, campaigners and activists across the country.’
She said that ‘Westminster is broken but the real crisis is deeper’ and the ‘two-party system offers nothing but managed decline and broken promises’.
‘A year ago I was suspended by the Labour Party for voting to abolish the two-child benefit cap and list 400,000 children out of poverty,’ the former Labour MP added. I’d do it again. I voted against scrapping winter fuel payments for pensioners. I’d do it again.
‘Now, the Government wants to make disabled people suffer; they just can’t decide how much.’
Appearing on ITV’s Peston on Wednesday – after opposing plans to proscribe Palestine Action as a terrorist group – he said he was working with groups ‘all around the country’
‘That grouping will come together. There will be an alternative view and there will be an alternative put there which is about a society that deals with poverty, inequality and a foreign policy that’s based on peace rather than war,’ he said.
Asked if he would like to lead the party he said: ‘I’m here to work, I’m here to serve the people in the way I’ve always tried to do.’
Sultana and Corbyn! Perhaps they can call it the ‘Fruit ‘n’ Party?
We need some fresh meat, and if no one in the government is willing to safeguard the people of the United Kingdom, then they should leave. That is the government’s first responsibility. There should be a cabinet that supports domestic initiatives and one that opposes foreign ones.
Other country’s issues are not ours – if they want to fight with each other they should just be allowed to get on with it, and we should become a neutral country that stays out of other country’s relations and focus on our own.
Politicians always seem to believe they are more intelligent than anyone else. Just because they went to University doesn’t mean they have any common sense!
THE MONTHLY MOSQUITO 