Corbynism returns: a new party on the Left

"To launch a political party is quite something," said Quentin Letts in the Daily Mail. "To bungle the launch of one," though, requires a special type of incompetence. This was on full display last week when firebrand Coventry South MP Zarah Sultana announced she was quitting Labour to co-lead a new left-wing party with Jeremy Corbyn - only for the whole project to collapse into farce within moments of its unveiling.

Sultana had proudly declared the (as yet unnamed) Leftist breakaway movement on X, saying that at the next election, voters would face a choice between "socialism or barbarism". Problem is, she appears to have "jumped the gun". "Comrade Corbyn" was reportedly blindsided by her post and furious; he refused to confirm he would be co-leading the party, only going so far as to say that a "real alternative" to Labour was coming. The chaos was an "absolute gift" to Keir Starmer, said Zoë Grünewald in The i Paper. Rocked by the biggest rebellion of his career over welfare reform, the PM should have been left "on the ropes" by the prospect of a credible left-wing alternative. Instead, it was his challengers who looked "confused and divided".

It wasn't the smoothest of debuts, said Peter Franklin on UnHerd, and the turbulence may continue. It has been reported that Corbyn and Sultana want their alliance to be based on opposition to the "genocide in Gaza" and on the cost of living. That will mean rallying support from among secular progressive Leftists and Muslim voters - which won't be easy. These factions "agree on foreign policy and largely on economics", but they're "worlds apart on social issues such as abortion".

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But if the left-wingers do get their act together, said Andrew Grice in The Independent, it could spell catastrophe for Starmer. A Corbyn-led party would attract at least 10% of the vote, according to More in Common - more than enough to unseat scores of Labour MPs. Cabinet big-hitters such as Wes Streeting and Jess Phillips, whose constituencies have large Muslim populations, and who only just staved off challenges from "Gaza independents" at the last election, would very likely lose their seats if Corbyn's alliance comes to fruition. The Greens may well also be losers here - unless they form a pact with the left-wingers.

It seems the death of the Labour Left was exaggerated, said Aletha Adu in The Guardian. A year ago, riding high on electoral victory and having suspended Corbyn and removed the whip from Sultana, Starmer's team gloated that they'd buried the Left. But if the welfare rebellion and this alliance are anything to go by, it is "very much alive".