John mcdonnell

Punch and Judy politics is clearly the mood of the moment in the House of Commons. Last week, David Cameron offered Corbyn some motherly advice on his dress sense, while a Tory MP heckled Jeremy Corbyn by yelling ‘who are you?’ during an EU debate. This morning, it was Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell’s turn to be on the receiving end of some Chamber abuse. After trying to get the Government to withdraw its proposals over regulatory regimes for senior bankers, he sat back down but didn’t quite get the answer he expected. Before Chief Secretary to the Treasury Greg Hands stepped up to reply, a Tory MP on the other side

Since Jeremy Corbyn’s election as Labour leader, the party has been dogged by rumours that George Galloway could rejoin the party. The Respect party leader — who was expelled in 2003 following his outspoken comments on the Iraq war — has called for his expulsion to be rescinded. Corbyn has refused to rule out such a move, while Galloway claims that he speaks to Corbyn’s director of comms Seumas Milne — who he describes as his ‘best friend’ — on a regular basis. However, in a sign that not everyone may be so on board with such a move, Corbyn’s close comrade John McDonnell has made a hire that is unlikely to sit

Although Jeremy Corbyn has only been Labour leader since September, there has been much talk from various fractions of the party about who might succeed him. While many Blairites hope someone like Dan Jarvis or Chuka Umunna will be next, Ken Livingstone has now offered his prediction. In an interview with Sam Delaney — on Russia Today — the former Mayor of London says that if Corbyn were killed tomorrow, it would be John McDonnell who would become Labour leader: ‘If Jeremy was pushed under a bus being driven by Boris Johnson, it would all rally behind John McDonnell. Because John, like Jeremy, like me, he’s been in this game for 45 years. [He’s]

It is very sporting of John McDonnell to release his tax return for us all to inspect. It is reassuring to see that he isn’t posing as a hero of the working man while living off rent from a property portfolio, and that he hasn’t been working on the side for Vodafone or Google while laying into their tax affairs. Presumably it is the very simplicity of his tax return with which he hoped to impress us. But that is what is bothering me – the lack of entries. Apart from his income of £61,575 as an MP and a pension of £14,421 from his career in local government he

Today is deadline day for all self-assessment tax returns, with those who fail to submit their return in line for a late-fee penalty. Happily John McDonnell looks set to escape this fate — he tweeted a picture of his tax return this morning. What’s more, the shadow chancellor of the exchequer is challenging George Osborne to do the same: After the #googletax deal for openness and transparency I've published my tax return today. Now it's Osborne's turn pic.twitter.com/Zrkecsk2M7 — John McDonnell MP (@johnmcdonnellMP) January 31, 2016 Given that MPs were on a salary of £67,060 for the tax year ending April 2015, the £61,575 declared may be a reduced figure in light

Corbynterpretation [n]: The inevitable process of debate, after Jeremy Corbyn is interviewed, over what he actually meant. Does the Labour leader believe the killing of Osama bin Laden was a tragedy, or not believe this? Would he like Britain to negotiate with Daesh or would he be opposed to that happening? Would he, or would he not, abandon the Falkland Islands? As in, ‘Well, that’s a matter of Corbynterpretation’ or, ‘No, no, those remarks have been totally misCorbynterpreted.’ In order to Corbynterpret [v] one must first consider 1. Whether the Labour leader brought up the disputed view himself (invariably not) 2. Whether the Labour leader clearly said ‘yes’ after somebody

According to John McDonnell, the reason three Labour frontbenchers resigned today is that there is a ‘group within the Labour party who have a right-wing conservative agenda. Within Progress itself, there are some who are quite hard right, and I think they’ve never accepted Jeremy’s leadership’. McDonnell told Channel 4 News that these ‘hard right’ MPs were still welcome in the Labour party because it is a ‘broad church’, but it was clear that he wants to paint Progress, largely a Blairite campaign group, as a menace. Certainly Progress has a different approach to left-wing politics than McDonnell. And it’s not supportive of the current Labour leadership. But the Shadow

While the abuse Labour MPs — including Stella Creasy and Ann Coffey — have received since they voted for airstrikes has been much-reported, what about the Labour politicians who voted against airstrikes on Syria? According to John McDonnell, these MPs are subject to online abuse too. The Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer appeared to try and prove this point over the weekend, by sharing a tweet directed at McDonnell which criticised him for showing ‘sympathy towards the cause of terrorists’. Alas, the mentioned abuse came from his own account, so he was in fact just tweeting abuse at himself: As users began to question whether he had meant to tweet abuse at himself from a

Jeremy Corbyn is a rarity among politicians. All his enemies are on his own side. For the Tories, Ukip and the SNP, Corbyn is a dream made real. They could not love him more. As the riotous scenes at the shadow cabinet and parliamentary Labour party meetings this week showed, his colleagues see Corbyn and John McDonnell as modern Leninists who are mobilising their cadres to purge all dissidents from the party. Conversations with Corbyn’s aides show a gentler side to the new regime, however. They suggest the Corbynistas are unlikely to be able to control Labour MPs when they can barely control themselves. ‘Chaos’ was the word that came

John McDonnell spoke at a Momentum curry dinner in Oldham yesterday evening, following a day on the doorstep ahead of Thursday’s by-election. I was lurking at the back and there weren’t many other journalists there. The shadow chancellor raised expectations for Labour holding onto the seat, as well as telling Momentum activists that the party has to defeat Ukip, who are seen as the most likely challengers, because it is an ‘evil force within our society’: WATCH 1/3 John McDonnell at Momentum curry dinner: #Ukip is “an evil force within our society” https://t.co/H8qzcmrQ1S — Sebastian Payne (@SebastianEPayne) November 29, 2015 ‘There are some within the party, and in the media in particular, who are

Two weeks after Paris we finally have some clarity from the political left. The current stance of their leadership (as expressed in the Parliamentary Labour party) is that while there is no justification for bombing ISIS, there are many reasons to bomb London. On the same evening that Jeremy Corbyn told his party that he could not support airstrikes on ISIS his old comrade (and head of the Labour party’s new ‘defence review’) Ken Livingstone shared his view on Question Time that the 7/7 bombers ‘gave their lives’ in an act of supremely selfless objection to the 2nd Iraq War. Now I know that there are a few people still

Nothing about the crisis in the Labour party makes sense until you find the honesty to admit that far leftists have taken over its leadership, and the clarity to see them for what they are. Contrary to the wishful thinking of so many Corbyn supporters, these are not decent, well-meaning men, who want to take Labour back to its roots. Nor are they pacifists and idealists you can look on with an indulgent smile and say, ‘I wish they were right, but their ideas will never work in the real world, more’s the pity’. To the delight of the Conservative Party, SNP and Ukip, they are genuine extremists from a

You can see what John McDonnell was trying to do today. ‘I’ll bring along a copy of Chairman Mao’s Little Red Book, wave it at George Osborne and make a joke about kowtowing to China’, he must have thought. It became obvious after his statement that the joke had backfired so McDonnell must have then thought ‘what should I do to show I’m not a Maoist?’. His response was to naturally indulge in some Stalinist censorship. In the video above of McDonnell’s response to the Autumn Statement, released on his YouTube channel, the Mao joke has been erased. At 6:06, the video fades out from the shadow chancellor discussing the sale of public