The latest lowlight in remnants of the Labour Party of many under the grim reign of Jeremy Corbyn has emerged tonight at tonight’s hustings meeting between the inglorious leader and Owen Smith. Rarely have I seen a more inept performance from a so-called serious politician. But not only was Corbyn hopeless, he was lying through our teeth.
His biggest lie was so big it could be seen from space. Corbyn asserted that Labour was actually ahead in the opinion polls when the resignations from his shadow cabinet began. The fact is that Labour was, on average, eight points behind the Tories when he sacked Hilary Benn.
There must be a belief among the Corbynistas that the electorate is stupid and incapable of making up its own mind on important matters of state. It is probably true that some people are influenced by what they see in the Sun and Mail, in the modern age hardly anyone reads the Sun and the Mail. I suspect they make judgements on the basis of making their own minds up. And if anyone has been watching Corbyn in tonight’s debate, they will understand why Labour is in a mess.
Whilst Smith was hot on facts and policies, Corbyn spoke in generalities and platitudes. With climate change, Smith’s arguments were clear and concise. Corbyn mumbled something about having attended a meeting in Paris. Asked whether war was ever necessary, Smith mentioned World War 2 and Spanish fascism, Corbyn replied hard to say never but it was better to talk. If only the opposition could summon Hitler and Franco for a quick cuppa and all that mass murder could have been avoided. And so it went on. On any subject, Corbyn was utterly devoid of anything close to a policy. Just positions and happy-clappy slogans.
But the lowest of several low points was when Owen Smith made the entirely unreasonable suggestion that Labour should seek to win general elections and was booed by large sections of the comrades. Just like they booed him the other night when he condemned anti-semitism. If I was Lynton Crosby, I’d be keeping a copy of these gems for use in the next general election campaign.
Even allies like Owen Jones, the left wing writer, said the other day that he only ever saw Corbyn as a stopgap leader, which a stopgap more than I would ever have given him. He got slated for it, but on tonight’s performance alone he was right.
The Independent got it right today when it predicted that Corbyn will almost certainly win the Labour leadership by a huge margin. I can’t see any way that he won’t. The headline was this: “Corbyn is going absolutely nowhere.” Ain’t that the truth?
