Jeremy Corbyn Risks Total Exclusion From Labour After Accepting Donation

Former party leader Jeremy Corbyn, who sits as an independent MP but is still an ordinary Labour member, faces the prospect of being excluded altogether from Labour after accepting a donation from We Deserve Better, PoliticsHome understands.

Corbyn was suspended both as a member and a Labour MP in 2020 over his response to the Equality and Human Rights Commission report on antisemitism in Labour. He was readmitted to the party the following month, after the matter was considered by Labour’s national executive committee (NEC), but he was not let back into the parliamentary party.

The ex-leader’s Labour membership is now in doubt, however, as it is understood that complaints have been submitted to the party about his acceptance of a donation from the recently established organisation ‘We Deserve Better’. The group, backed by commentator Owen Jones, is supporting individual “socialist candidates”, including the Green Party’s Carla Denyer against shadow cabinet member Thangam Debbonaire.

Corbyn’s registered interests were updated this month to show that he accepted £5,000 from We Deserve Better on 12 April 2024 for “political activities”.

PoliticsHome understands that the party is looking at the donation, and Labour sources have suggested that Corbyn now faces possible exclusion from Labour. Party rules state that any member “declaring an intention to stand in a public election in opposition to a party candidate” faces auto-exclusion from the party.

It is also against the rules for a member to support “any political organisation that the NEC in its absolute discretion shall declare to be inimical with the aims and values of the party”.

Complaints against Corbyn on this matter would be considered, along with other possible cases of