by Luke James

Parliamentary Reporter

JEREMY CORBYN hit back at “reds under the bed” smears against his supporters yesterday as he closed in on re-election as Labour leader.

With five days to go until the conclusion of the race, two new documentaries containing allegations of infiltration and deselection campaigns will be broadcast tonight.

Shadow defence secretary Clive Lewis branded the claims “reds under the bed scare stories.”

Mr Corbyn insisted the influx of new members was “very exciting” and defended his plans to democratise the party in the face of “elitist” politics.

A Channel 4 Dispatches documentary alleges the existence of “a band of hard-left extremists plotting to take over Labour” and “oust anti-Corbyn MPs” through the Momentum group.

And an episode of BBC Panorama following “the battle for the soul of Labour” in Brighton suggests Labour “ ‘moderates’ fear election annihilation and deselection.”

Asked whether Trotskyists are attempting to “seize” control of the party on ITV’s Peston on Sunday programme, Mr Corbyn said: “Nobody is seizing control of anything.

“What we’ve got is a 300,000 increase in membership in one year.

“So any party that had had that increase in membership, would be a very different place.

“Those members come from a very wide range of political opinion.

“Many are completely new to politics, some are older members returning to the Labour Party because they left over Iraq or other issues. A lot are actually young people who are in politics for the first time. It’s actually very exciting.”

The Labour leader vowed to “reach out” to MPs from across the party if he is re-elected on Saturday and his team revealed plans at the weekend that would see MPs elect a third of the shadow cabinet.

Another third would be appointed directly by the leader, while the final third would be elected by members.

“I think there is a growing feeling within our society that too much politics is top down,” he said yesterday.

“There’s too much elitism in politics and there has to be a much greater representation of members of the party, who after all raise the funds, run the party, knock on the doors, deliver leaflets and deliver election results on which our MPs rely.”

Momentum has threatened to refer Channel 4 to Ofcom, saying the programme “will raise more concerns about the impartiality of the broadcaster than anything else.”

A spokesman for the group said undercover reporter Gesh Mohammed could have found the same information through interviews or attending meetings “rather than through lying.”

The programme includes footage of a meeting of a Momentum branch in Lewisham where a guest speaker discusses deselecting Hove MP Peter Kyle.

Momentum national organiser James Schneider stressed yesterday that activists “are not campaigning for deselections,” pointing out the speaker is not a member of Momentum.

Meanwhile, Clive Lewis pointed out the BBC Panorama programme has been produced by the same company which made the “hatchet job” on Mr Corbyn broadcast days before he was elected leader last year.

Films of Record’s Jeremy Corbyn: Labour’s Earthquake gave a platform for the party’s disgruntled right to lay into the leadership hopeful.

“Deselection hasn’t come up as I understand it,” Mr Lewis told the BBC’s Andrew Marr show.

“If it does, as far as I’m concerned that a democratic choice for our members.”

In an interview for Panorama, Unite general secretary Len McCluskey does speak out in support of members wishing to deselect MPs who behaved in a way that was “totally disrespectful” towards Mr Corbyn’s mandate.

He said: “I believe some of the MPs have behaved absolutely despicably and disgracefully and they’ve not shown any respect whatsoever to er to the leader. They should be held to account.”

lukejames@peoples-press.com

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