The Daily Mail has done some excellent work recently exposing the government over its false coronavirus narrative, but it got the above story about Jeremy Corbyn and his followers completely wrong. In fact if anything the latest lockdown vote proved a total humiliation for Corbyn. The 15 MPs who rebelled against the party whips were not all loyal to Corbyn. Just eight of those who voted against the new English lockdown are members of the Socialist Campaign Group - Begum, Burgon, Foy, Mearns, Morris, Osborne, Ribeiro-Addy and Sultana. The other seven were Labour moderates, none of whom nominated Corbyn for the leadership in 2015 and four of them - Gwynne, Jones, Lewell-Buck and Spellar - backed Owen Smith against Corbyn in the 2016 leadership contest.
If this was any attempt by Corbyn to 'lead' a rebellion then it failed miserably. The Socialist Campaign Group has 34 members and crucially includes the likes of Diane Abbott, Ian Lavery, Rebecca Long-Bailey, John McDonnell and Nadia Whittome - none of whom voted with Corbyn. Even Claudia Webbe, who like Corbyn is currently suspended from the Parliamentary Labour Party, abstained in line with party whips.
The Daily Mail story has since been edited and the headline completely reworded to: "Ex-Opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn and 15 Labour MPs defy new party boss Keir Starmer to vote AGAINST the Government's new coronavirus tiers".
Don't believe everything you read in the newspapers.
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