In the past few weeks, the unexpected announcement by ex-Labour MP Zarah Sultana of a new left-of-Labour party was received ecstatically by millions of people across Britain who are desperate to support a political force which will opposes Keir Starmer’s support for genocide and austerity.
At the time of writing, over 650,000 people have signed up to potentially become members of the party. And beyond typically unperceptive media opinion, the announcement has also seen a flowering of discussion from a British Left all too keenly aware of its forced absence from ‘mainstream’ political debate since 2022.
Last week, Tribune associate editor Marcus Barnett met with ex-Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, who is a key figure in the development of the ‘new party’, to discuss some of the various attitudes being hammered out–from taking the initiative from Reform over directing mass disenfranchisement to questions over how broad a ‘broad tent’ may be, community organising, the question of the Greens, and if it’s possible to avoid the errors of the past when it comes to left-wing electoral challenges to Labour.
Marcus Barnett: The launch of a potential new left party has seen thousands of people rekindle their hopes to make their country and their world a better place. What do you think the sign-ups tell you about the scale of political disenfranchisement?
Jeremy Corbyn: 650,000 people don’t sign up to a new project for no reason. They sign up because they have had enough. They’ve had enough of being made poorer while the rich get richer. They’ve had enough of rising water bills in return for burst pipes and sewage in our seas. They’ve had enough of making basic demands–like ensuring disabled people have enough support to live in dignity–and being ignored. They’ve had enough of being shut out of the decisions that affect their daily lives.
You look at the problems facing society today: food banks are a major feature of life for thousands of people. Tenants in private sector flats are spending well over half their take-home pay. There’s massive levels of stress for people of all ages. When a government comes into office promising things will change, and then nothing does, something has to give. This energy has been pent up for a while, given that none of these issues are new. Successive governments have refused to do anything about them. That is going to have a consequence–they are reaping what they have sowed.
Announcing the party’s website was like watching a dam break. People who had been denied a real alternative suddenly had something to sign up to. They had a reason to hope. We set out a fairly skeletal political vision, based on foundational principles of equality and peace. We included public ownership, wealth taxes, investment in council housing, and support for Palestine. We did not need to lay out a more detailed vision, not least because that will be decided by members, but because people could see the kind of direction of travel we stood for. That was a direction of travel they’ve been denied for so long: one that seeks to redistribute wealth and power.
MB: Do you have some sense yet about the sort of people who have been signing up?
JC: As you’d expect, we’ve had big signup numbers in big cities like London, Liverpool, Manchester, and Newcastle. What I’ve been surprised by, though, is generally how spread out and balanced the support has been across all regions and nations. The support is strongest in London, the North West, and Yorkshire and the Humber, but it also spreads far and wide–even as far as the Outer Hebrides.
This is testament to the fact that the problems we face are fundamental and affect people right across the country: poverty, wage depression, stress, decaying public services, growing social isolation.
Most of the people who come up to me saying they’ve signed up have clearly been waiting a while. They sound excited, almost restless. But above all, they sound hopeful. I’ve also been approached by people who have never really been involved in politics before. It was a similar reaction to what I experienced during our election campaign last year. We are building a new kind of political party that is going to provide a home for people who have been denied a voice by our stale two-party system.
MB: ‘Restless’ indeed–since your suspension from Labour, the calls for a new political formation to be led by you and your principles have been consistently loud. The announcement feels like the end of a very long process which started with the Labour Right’s attacks on you nearly half a decade ago. How has all of this been arrived at?
JC: Plenty of good comrades have approached me over the years suggesting that there needs to be a new political voice in this country.
After I was suspended as a member of the Parliamentary Labour Party, I remained as a Labour Party member and backbench MP, with support from many comrades locally who wanted to assert their democratic rights as local Labour Party members. Keir Starmer finally banned me from standing as a Labour candidate, which was a disgraceful assault on local democracy; my view was that the people should decide. That’s why I stood as an Independent candidate.
Winning an election as an Independent, before launching a party, I think will prove historically significant. I felt that winning in Islington North was important, not just for our community but people beyond it. Setting up a new party beforehand, at relatively short notice, would have likely meant me travelling up and down the country, which would have had a significant cost to our campaign locally.
It was during the election campaign that it became more obvious why, in the near future, there would need to be a new voice. I was taken aback by the number of people who I’d never met before, from around the country, many of whom had not been involved in politics, who suddenly wanted to be part of our campaign. That, to me, was indicative of the level of support out there for a real political alternative.
Since the election, the calls for a new political party have become louder and more widespread. I’ve had lots of discussions with a lot of people, and it has become increasingly clear why a new party is not just possible but fundamentally necessary.
Let’s be clear: Labour has completely and utterly failed to bring about the change it promised–whether that’s its refusal to scrap the two-child benefit cap, the removal of disability benefits, the betrayal of the WASPI women, the winter fuel cuts, or its atrocious complicity in the slaughter of Palestinians.
And right now, we face a situation where Labour is paving the path to a Reform government. We are at a critical juncture in British politics–and so that’s why we’ve decided to launch a new political party. If we want to live in a society of equality, inclusion and peace, not inequality, division and war, then we need to make the case for an alternative.
MB: There has been a conscious decision to build an entirely new structure. What is the thinking behind this? Is it to do with problems you’ve foreseen in a top-down party? Are they based on your own experiences in Labour, or even leading it, for example?
JC: Over the past 40 years in parliament, I have witnessed firsthand the reasons why our political system is completely broken.
One of those reasons is how our political parties are structured. They are top-down, centralised and bureaucratic. When I was leader of the Labour Party, I faced enormous opposition to supporting Community Organising Units (COUs), the basic premise of which was to allow local communities to organise for themselves, given they know the issues they face.
This breeds trust, and the party becomes embedded within those communities, which breeds much greater electoral success. In 2019, our vote was higher in the seats where COUs existed. If it weren’t for such bureaucratic obstruction that delayed its introduction, it could have had a much greater impact.
Looking at the Labour Party now, it’s as if MPs are afraid of the people they are meant to represent–and when you get highly centralised parties, you get bad policies and decisions like privatisation of public services, like invading Iraq, like austerity.
So that’s why we’ve tried to do something different. Politics should be about empowerment–and that’s why I want this party to be about. A party that is open, inclusive, grassroots-based, and democratic. Many in our media struggled to understand the idea of letting ordinary people shape the future of our party. For the 650,000 people who signed up, it wasn’t so hard to understand.
By the end of the year, we want to come together at an inaugural conference to decide the direction of our party and what it stands for, but this conference will not come out of the blue. It will be the product of a series of deliberative meetings up and down the country. More than just rallies, these meetings will be an opportunity for communities, social movements and trade unions to come together to discuss the key questions facing the future of our party and our country. These meetings will generate fierce debates, I’m sure, and that’s good. That’s what democracy is for.
MB: What could a democratic organisation actually mean in this context? How would the party relate to wider social movements, such as housing or anti-war organisations?
JC: I recently wrote in an article that one of the biggest mistakes a party can make is thinking it must choose between parliament and other forms of action. We need to organise everywhere: in localities, in parliament, in workplaces, and in our communities. That’s the power of a democratic party: it can empower ordinary people to shape its priorities, not just people who are trained to lobby MPs in parliament. That’s how we link up campaigns across society.
If you look at the past year in politics, some would say it’s defined by Labour’s failure. I say something slightly different. It’s defined by the extraordinary growth of movements: trade unions, tenants’ unions, disability justice campaigners, anti-racist campaigners, climate activists, and peace activists. These groups can only achieve so much on their own; think of what they could achieve together, if only they were empowered to do so.
MB: Taking the temperature of various trade unions, many shop stewards and senior union officials–who would traditionally be very wedded to the Labour Left or even further to the party’s right-wing–are expressing real curiosity towards the new project.
JC: I speak to union officials, leaders, and members regularly. It’s abundantly clear that there is widespread discontent toward the direction this government has taken. I want to see our new party work with unions and social movements up and down the country. I am personally very happy to work with all types of unions.
I also want the party to support workers who haven’t been able to organise, particularly in the gig economy. Earlier this year we held a fantastic People’s Forum in Islington North, which focused on the gig economy. There was a recognition that real improvements come through workers acting as a united power.
It’s also important that we don’t see the trade union movement as separate from other parts of our movement, like the peace movement. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Chris Smalls from the U.S., organising for Amazon workers. He also recently joined the Freedom Flotilla to Gaza. He is a testament to how we need not choose between campaigning for workers and campaigning for Palestine. We must do both!
MB: On a similar question, when could you say that a coalition may be too broad? What are the contradictions you see emerging, and how might they be overcome?
JC: I work well with my independent colleagues, primarily as a united voice against the genocide in Gaza. They have provided a lot of hope for people who know there are MPs in Parliament who stand up unashamedly for the Palestinian people. We don’t always agree on everything, but we have provided clear opposition on a range of issues: the two-child benefit cap, winter fuel cuts, disability benefit cuts, and arms sales to Israel.
I am a believer in the power of unity through democracy. Yes, this new party is going to generate disagreements and divides. We should be open and honest about them, and rely on democratic institutions to work through them in a constructive and productive way. We need to build a movement that recognises the diversity of opinion, but one that stands up for the human rights and dignity of all. We must be united against oppression and prejudice in all its forms–and that is what we will be.
MB: Based on the lessons from everything from the SLP to Respect, what are your thoughts on how a left-wing party can survive the usual disasters fuelled by personality cults and internecine sectarian warfare?
JC: I want this party to be open, inclusive, and grassroots. The structure needs to, in some way, reflect the broad geographical nature of our support and empower local communities to bring about change from below. What I don’t want is endless battles over who is on what national committee.
The way you keep a party together is by sticking to the fundamental issues and campaigns like child poverty, human rights, and peace. Let’s remember why we’re doing this: to transform society by redistributing wealth and power. This is not about us as activists. This is about the millions of people who deserve a better life. It’s about the children living in poverty. It’s about the people of Palestine. It’s about them, not us.
MB: And what are your thoughts on an alliance with the Greens?
JC: This new party is going to be very strong on environmental issues, grounded in the belief that climate justice is social justice. We will work with the Greens where we can work with them, obviously on environmental issues but also, I hope, on issues of peace and human rights. I’m always open to working with like-minded individuals and groups. Cooperation makes us all stronger.
I know many Green members, I work well with the Green MPs in parliament, and we’ve cooperated when we can. That has helped to build an alliance of opposition against several issues, namely the cuts to disability benefits. I’ve also campaigned alongside Zack on many issues, appearing on many anti-austerity platforms together.
Right now, our priority should be stopping Angela Rayner’s attack on allotments!