GORDON Brown has warned the Labour Party that it must be electable if it wants to make a difference to the lives of society’s most vulnerable.
Although Brown did not mention Jeremy Corbyn by name, the former Prime Minister’s speech was quite clearly an attack on the Labour leadership frontrunner.
Brown, who stood down from Parliament at May’s General Election, conceded Labour were “broken hearted”.
Speaking at London’s Festival Hall, he said: “There is one thing worse than having broken hearts, it is powerlessness.
“Our hearts can be broken and yet it is worse to find out we are powerless to do anything about it. To see a wrong and not be able to right it, to see an injustice and not be able to correct it, to see suffering and be able to do nothing about it, to see pain and know you cannot heal it, to see good that needs to be done and change that needs to be made and not to be in a position to do it.
“When I know, and I argued, and I think you believe, that the only way that we can avert the pain and end the suffering is by securing in the future the election of a Labour government to deliver on our priorities.
“And when I see the opinion polls that say the one grouping in the party that is likely to get most votes is the one grouping that even its own supporters say is least likely to be able to form a government, then we have to look at the lessons of our history.”
Brown’s most explicit attack on Corbyn came during a section on foreign policy, though he still didn’t mention the MP for Islington North by name.
Brown said: “If we are going to solve the problems of global inequality and poverty, we will need a level of global co-operation to match our national endeavours that is higher, and at a far more sustained and advance level, than ever before.
“And I have to say, if our global alliances are going to be alliances with Hezbollah and Hamas and Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela and Vladimir Putin’s Russia, there is no chance of building a worldwide alliance that could deal with poverty and inequality and climate change and financial instability.”
Brown had been expected to come out in support of Yvette Cooper, but in the end kept his counsel.
The former Kirkcaldy MP didn’t stop moving once during the speech. He frantically paced from left to right, quoting Tony Blair, John Smith, Neil Kinnock and Michael Foot.
Corbyn’s spokesman welcomed Brown’s intervention. “Gordon Brown has highlighted the need for a Labour Party that stands for hope, that is credible, radical and electable – on which basis the best candidate to vote for is Jeremy Corbyn.
“It is necessary to be credible but credibility cannot mean an orthodoxy of austerity that chokes off recovery – instead we need a Labour Party that stands for growth, investment and innovation across the whole country.
“Jeremy Corbyn’s clear plans for growth-led recovery rather than austerity mark him out as the candidate offering hope and drawing in thousands of new people in the process. Polls vary but most have shown that Jeremy Corbyn is the candidate most likely to engage with voters beyond Labour’s existing supporters.
“Whoever wins this leadership election will have a massive direct personal mandate, and that is a powerful springboard for winning in 2020.”
Ahead of Brown’s speech, Labour newly elected Labour MP Clive Lewis attacked the economic policy of his party’s old leader.
The MP, who is backing Corbyn, tweeted a link to Brown’s Mansion House speech from 2006 on “light touch regulation” and questioned if the former Chancellor was “qualified to lecture on ‘economic credibility’.”
Meanwhile, Andy Burnham yesterday claimed he would be the candidate to stop the party from splitting.
During a visit to the West Midlands, Burnham said only he could beat Corbyn. “Jeremy’s had a big impact but yes, it’s winnable,” he said. “And I’d go further and say, I am now the only candidate who can beat him.”
Burnham continued: “Some people have talked of walking away and not serving. I’m not one of those. I said I will try to make it work. I will never leave Labour. Never. But I can’t speak for everybody. I’m not saying it will happen. But there’s a risk of disunity and a risk of a split.”
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