Jeremy Corbyn Is Finished

The Labour Party may have only elected its new leader in September, but it is now clear that they will be electing another in the very near future. After many of the party’s MPs have spent the intervening time throwing a variety of mardy strops, the time has come when, whatever assurances Jeremy Corbyn gives in rounds of media interviews, he will no longer be permitted to function as party leader.

That the endgame is now being played is not down to the tedious succession of whinging pundits, for whom nothing less than the reinstallation of Tony Blair at the head of the party will be enough to quell their anguish, but that the petulant behaviour of some MPs who should know better has now been accompanied by clear signs that potential leadership contenders are breaking ranks and going, shall we say, “on manoeuvres”.

First of these, although he did not submit himself to the membership earlier this year, has been Hilary Benn, who is determined to speak in favour of dropping significant amounts of high explosive on the mainly civilian populations in those parts of Syria controlled by ISIS. That Benn - and several other Labour MPs - give the impression of wanting to rain death on the unfortunate inhabitants of Raqqa as a way of kicking Corbyn shows just how shameless and insular this exercise has become.

Once Benn had kicked off, and apparently he continued to reinforce his position at yesterday evening’s meeting of the Parliamentary party, the effect was as to fire the starting gun, and soon deputy leader Tom Watson was, effectively, positioning himself for what was becoming the inevitable end of the Corbyn era.

Not to be outdone, Andy Burnham “the shadow home secretary, who is not convinced about airstrikes, used some of the strongest rhetoric as he said he refused to be part of a ‘sham shadow cabinet’”. So he’s getting ready to run, too, as is Yvette Cooper, “who made similar comments to [Margaret] Beckett accusing Corbyn’s supporters of trying to divide the party”. Benn has now said he doesn’t want the leadership, but the damage is done.

What part does this week’s Oldham West and Royton by-election play in the scrabble to get Corbyn out and another leadership election on the go? Should UKIP actually win the seat, it is highly likely that Corbyn’s leadership will be tipped over the edge there and then. But even a close finish - say, a Labour majority of less than 5,000 - will be used as an excuse to move the Islington North MP closer to the exit door.

Now that the pushing and shoving among potential leadership candidates has started, there is no way back. Labour has not removed a leader without allowing them to contest a General Election since the fall of George Lansbury at the 1935 party conference. But that is the course of events that has now been set in train. Not even the Labour Party will entertain a leader who is quietly principled but insufficiently bellicose.

It is unedifying. It is not pleasant. It verges on the desperate. And that, folks, is politics.