- The Labour leader was joined at plush offices behind the Savoy in London
- Last night Mr Corbyn hailed manifesto as blueprint for ‘more egalitarian society’
- Seumas Milne and a slew of controversial senior party figures attended meeting
Jeremy Corbyn gathered his closest hard-Left allies yesterday to sign off his radical ‘Marxist manifesto’ that includes a deluge of new taxes and spending pledges.
The Labour leader was joined at plush offices behind the Savoy in London by key aides such as Seumas Milne and a slew of controversial senior party figures to hammer out the final details of his Election policies amid a bitter civil war over immigration.
Last night Mr Corbyn hailed his manifesto as a blueprint for a ‘more egalitarian society’ adding: ‘I am very, very proud of the contents of it.’
Jeremy Corbyn (pictured) gathered his closest hard-Left allies yesterday to sign off his radical ‘Marxist manifesto’ that includes a deluge of new taxes and spending pledges
Under Clause V of the party’s constitution, the leader must share his programme for government with his Shadow Cabinet, trade union bankrollers such as Len McCluskey and the powerful NEC before it can be published.
But trust among the various factions is so limited that mobile phones were confiscated and no one was allowed to keep a copy of the manifesto to avoid a repeat of the humiliating 2017 leak.
Labour’s conference mandated the party to stick to EU free movement rules but party strategists feared such a policy would see the party wiped out with Leave-supporting voters in their northern heartlands.
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The Mail on Sunday was told the issue was ‘fudged’, with the manifesto planning to state simply that freedom of movement for EU citizens would continue if the UK stayed in the bloc but is ‘a matter for the negotiations’ if the country leaves. The manifesto is due to be published on Thursday but last night sources said it contains significantly more Left-wing policies than the 2017 version.
Insiders told this newspaper the radical blueprint for government agreed unanimously last night is set to include:
- Scrapping of ‘opt-outs’ for the EU Working Time Directive, banning anyone from working for more than 48 hours a week and potentially risking NHS chaos;
- A Right to Food Act that could be used to control some food prices;
- A windfall tax on oil companies that risks pushing up petrol prices;
- A widespread nationalisation programme of trains, energy firms and broadband providers;
- The effective abolition of academies and free schools, with all educational institutions bought back under local council control;
- A milkshake tax, with a massive expansion of the sugar levy;
- Abolition of local NHS Clinical Commissioning Groups;
- A new Cabinet Minister for Women and new laws to make misogyny a hate crime, which one critic claimed would amount to outlawing wolf-whistling.
The manifesto was written by Andrew Fisher, despite the key Corbyn aide saying in a private memo earlier this year that ‘I no longer have faith that we can succeed’. He also accused colleagues of a ‘lack of professionalism, competence and human decency’.
Left: Claudia Webbe: Railed against Ken Livingstone’s suspension after he compared Jewish reporter to concentration camp guard. Right: Richard Corbett: Sickeningly claimed Remain would win second referendum because elderly Brexit voters were dying off
The radical Left-winger once boasted on camera that he had ‘very violent, bloody nightmares… fantasies’ about hitting former Labour Cabinet Minister James Purnell because of his views on welfare.
Among those present to sign off the charter was controversial MEP Richard Corbett, one of Labour’s most ardent pro-Europeans. The leader of the party in Brussels sparked outrage last year for appearing to celebrate the death of Leave voters.
Talking about the prospects for Remain in a second referendum, Corbett said: ‘As someone joked to me the other day, where there’s death, there’s hope.’ The remark was condemned for being ‘as tasteless as it is misguided’.
Left: Len McCluskey: Accused Jewish community of ‘intransigent hostility’ towards Jeremy Corbyn. Right: Andrew Fisher: Boasted he had ‘very violent, bloody fantasies’ about assaulting former Labour Minister for cutting benefits
Also involved was key Corbyn backer Jon Lansman, who founded the powerful grassroots Momentum group, and who last year admitted possible economic chaos under a Corbyn government, saying: ‘Other governments have faced challenges like runs on the pound. And we may face similar things.’
They were joined by Claudia Webbe. She was such an ardent defender of Ken Livingstone that when the ex-London Mayor was suspended from the party in 2006 after likening a Jewish journalist to a concentration camp guard, she said the decision ‘smacks in the face of true democracy’.
A member of Labour’s ruling NEC, the Islington councillor has been selected to replace scandal-hit former MP Keith Vaz in Leicester East – a rock-solid Labour seat.Last night Labour refused to be drawn on the details of its manifesto but one source present branded plans to cap the number of hours people can work ‘a f****** mistake’.
If the EU Working Time Directive – which limits the working week to 48 hours and which most people can currently ignore – was extended to doctors and nurses, even some Labour MPs fear it would cause chaos in the NHS. Another source insisted the manifesto was nowhere near as radical as leaks suggest.
One MP said: ‘I think you’ll find there is a lot on the one hand this and the other hand that. There is plenty of wriggle room.’
Labour Party chairman Ian Lavery said: ‘This is the best manifesto you are likely to see.’
Asked if it was more radical than in 2017, Mr Lavery said that it was, adding: ‘We sorted all the problems and it was fantastic.
‘Everybody was up for it, very amicable, good discussions, good debate, very lengthy because we have got a great manifesto.’
Tory Trade Secretary Liz Truss branded it ‘a Marxist manifesto for Britain that will plunge this country into extortionate debt and deliver division and delay.’
Labour plans to keep freedom of movement would see 15,000 serious criminals passing through Britain’s jails in the next decade, a Home Office Minister has said.
The surge would require building 3,000 extra cells – the equivalent of four new prisons – at a cost of £600 million, according to Security Minister Brandon Lewis.
There are currently 4,028 EU nationals in our jails, costing £160 million a year to house. But citing Conservative Party analysis and modelling, Mr Lewis claims that will soar to 7,000 by 2029.
This number would rise further if Albania joined the EU – it is currently a candidate country. More than ten per cent of foreign prisoners in England and Wales are Albanian and over 7 per cent of the UK’s Albanian male population are currently in prison.
Labour pledged to maintain and extend free movement rights at their conference in September, but Ministers argue this would make it almost impossible to deport foreign criminals from the EU, even those guilty of the most serious crimes.
Jeremy Corbyn’s team have been rocked by bitter infighting over immigration, with union baron Len McCluskey criticising plans to widen free movement rules as wrong, while Shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott fully backs them.
The party’s manifesto is expected to state freedom of movement will continue if the UK stays in the EU, but would be subject to negotiations about the future relationship if we leave.
However, a conference policy motion passed by the party vowed to ‘maintain and extend free movement rights… and close all detention centres’.
At the time Mr Corbyn insisted: ‘What comes out of conference I will adhere to. I was elected to empower the members of the party. So if conference makes a decision I will not walk away from it and I will act accordingly.’
Last night Mr Lewis said: ‘Jeremy Corbyn has said that if he becomes Prime Minister, he will maintain and extend EU free movement. His plans would mean continued free movement for European criminals and foreign gangs. This is dangerous and British taxpayers would foot the bill.’
He added: ‘A Conservative majority Government will bring down overall migration.’
Jeremy Corbyn’s pledge to provide free fibre broadband for all will have a chilling effect on vital investment in Britain’s jobs and future, business leaders warned last night.
The Confederation of British Industry claimed Labour’s bid to part-nationalise BT as part of its plan would deter entrepreneurs from choosing this country.
CBI director-general Carolyn Fairbairn told The Mail on Sunday: ‘This is exactly the kind of announcement that will make investors think twice before putting their money into the UK.’
Speaking ahead of the organisation’s annual conference in London tomorrow, she also warned existing progress on expanding broadband coverage will be stopped in its tracks by Labour’s move.
The rebuke will be all the more embarrassing for the Labour leader as he is due to address the conference.
Labour say they will give every home and business in the UK free full-fibre broadband by 2030.
Dame Carolyn urged Mr Corbyn to come clean over Labour’s full nationalisation programme, and claimed the plan would have a ‘real chilling effect’.
But in a warning over Brexit to Boris Johnson’s Tories, the CBI – which is politically neutral – will unveil a new business manifesto stressing the need to get a good Brexit deal.
It will call for a ‘future relationship based on staying aligned with EU rules where they are essential for frictionless trade and protecting the UK’s world-beating services sector’.
Corbyn ally: He’s handled Brexit like a bungling wartime general
A key Jeremy Corbyn ally has compared the Labour leader’s handling of Brexit to a bungling First World War officer sending troops over the top to their slaughter.
Shadow Treasury Minister Clive Lewis told a meeting of Left-wingers that the party’s unclear stance on whether to oppose Britain’s exit from the EU was ‘a recipe for disaster’.
And he said the policy of delaying a decision on whether to back Leave or Remain in a potential second referendum was ‘no way to enter a General Election’.
In a recording obtained by The Mail on Sunday from a meeting organised by hardcore Corbyn supporters group Momentum, Mr Lewis evokes the imagery of the trenches in his blistering attack on his leader’s dithering.
He said: ‘We will go into a General Election telling voters, ‘Vote for us.’
‘ ‘Oh, what are you going to do on Brexit’ – ‘well we don’t know yet, we’ll make a decision… we’ll make a decision at a special conference, after a General Election.’
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‘That is no way to enter a General Election. That is a recipe for disaster.’
Mr Lewis added: ‘It is the equivalent of being in a trench and turning to the officers and saying, ‘What’s the objective?’
‘ ‘Well, I don’t know – let’s just go over the top and we’ll work it out when we get to the other side.’
‘It’s not going to work, and it is not something I think this party can now do if it is serious about opposing Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson.’
The outburst came at the World Transformed meeting on the fringes of the Labour Party’s conference in Brighton in September.
Mr Corbyn used the four-day meeting of pro-EU party members to ram through a fudged compromise policy to back a second Brexit referendum.
But he delayed a decision on which side to take until after an Election in a bid not to lose Leave-voting Labour voters in the party’s northern heartlands.
Labour have pledged to negotiate a new deal with Brussels, but have not yet said whether they would campaign against their own treaty in a public vote promised within six months of winning power.
Last night Conservative Brexit Secretary Steve Barclay warned of ‘endless chaos’ if Labour was elected. He said: ‘Labour’s front bench remains bitterly divided on Brexit, embroiled in a constant state of chaos and paralysing delay.
‘Labour don’t want to get Brexit done – they want us trapped in endless chaos with two more referendums, on Brexit and Scottish independence, all the while squabbling among themselves, ignoring the desperate cries for certainty and progress.’