Labour is to try to stop a “tsunami of abuse” by making all existing and new members sign a pledge about online behaviour or face being barred from the party.

The national executive committee (NEC) agreed to toughen up Labour’s stance on internet abuse during a crucial meeting on Tuesday, which comes as the party’s acrimonious leadership battle draws to a close.

During a session that stretched over eight hours, Jeremy Corbyn expressed disappointment and sadness about the way in which a flood of Labour MPs resigned from the frontbench in protest at his performance earlier in the summer.



The leader agreed to enter talks with senior colleagues – likely to include deputy leader, Tom Watson, chief whip Rosie Winterton and the chair of the parliamentary Labour party, John Cryer – about new ways to form his shadow cabinet. But he refused to sign up to a proposal by Watson, for MPs to be allowed to elect frontbenchers as a means of brokering peace within the parliamentary party.

A motion to place a deadline of Saturday 24 September on the talks, so a new system is in place when the result of the leadership contest is announced, was also narrowly defeated by 16 to 15 votes.



However the group unanimously agreed to a new statement on social media behaviour that will be included as a separate item in the terms and conditions of any membership.



Party members will have to explicitly promise “to act within the spirit and rules of the Labour party in my conduct both on and offline, with members and non-members”.

The statement they will have to sign adds: “I stand against all forms of abuse. I understand that if found to be in breach of the Labour party policy on online and offline abuse, I will be subject to the rules and procedures of the Labour party.”

Punishments could include being suspended from the party or eventually being expelled.

The pledge will be linked to a social media code of conduct, drawn up by the party, which warns that “harassment, intimidation, hateful language and bullying” will not be tolerated. It also lists discrimination on the basis of gender, race, religion, age, sexual orientation, gender identity or disability.

“Abusing someone online is just as serious as doing so face to face. We stand against all forms of abuse and will take action against those who commit it,” it adds, warning against the use of anonymous accounts, trolling, sexualised language, or the publication of private information.

The initiative comes after an MP, Ruth Smeeth, said that she had been subjected to 25,000 incidents of abuse, including a string of antisemitic attacks. The politician, who has been called a “CIA/MI5/Mossad informant” and a “fucking traitor,” said she believed that abuse had become normal for many colleagues.

She also revealed that she had received police protection after facing the vitriol, much of which occurred after she walked out of the launch of Shami Chakrabarti’s inquiry into antisemitism for the Labour party. “I think this is a great step forward,” said Smeeth, about the pledge. “MPs have been subject to a tsunami of abuse. It is unfortunate that we’ve got to this place but given the changing nature of social media I welcome the proposal.”

She praised Watson and Yvette Cooper MP, who chairs the Reclaim the Internet campaign, for drawing up the proposal, which was presented to the NEC but will need to be rubber stamped by Labour conference.

Cooper is expected to say on Saturday at a women’s conference prior to the main meeting in Liverpool that the party needs to go further .

As the committee meeting was taking place at Labour’s Westminster headquarters, Cooper retweeted an abusive message that she received online arguing that it was “not exactly the kinder, gentler politics, comrade ... ” The message simply said: “drop dead cooper”.

In a joint statement, Watson and Cooper said the move meant an “active commitment” from every member to the values of decency. “We have a problem, we need to be clearer about our values and about the standards acceptable in the Labour party – and this is an important step in doing so,” they said.

“When you’re signing up to the aims and values of the Labour party, being against abuse and behaving in a comradely manner is implicit. But, with what we have seen in recent months, we think this commitment should now be explicit.”

The pair said the party had a responsibility in the face of rising far-right abuse, online hatred, racism and misogyny which was “silencing people speaking out”.

Labour needed to stand up to that as it always had but “we can’t do that if some in our own party get sucked in as well” they added, saying there was an urgent need to restore decency to political debate.

Some MPs have criticised Corbyn for not taking strong enough action to protect Labour politicians from abuse when it comes from his supporters.

But the party leader fully backed this latest action and has said that he has also suffered abuse and “will absolutely not allow any sort of it, whatsoever, anywhere around our campaign”.

Launching a digital democracy manifesto last month, Corbyn said that he was worried about the impact on young people. “You wouldn’t gather around a young person and all shout abuse at them. That would be seen to be crude, brutal, violent and rude. But they do it on Facebook and they do it on Twitter and they do it online.”

The code of conduct says: “It is perfectly possible to have vehement disagreements without descending into personal abuse, shaming people or exhibiting bullying behaviour. Forcefully made points and criticisms of the political views of others are totally legitimate, personal attacks are not.



“Debates among party members should be comradely, acknowledging that whatever our diverse views, we are one party with shared goals. Derogatory descriptions of the positions of others should be avoided.”

It also says that it is never permissible to use anonymous accounts or hide an identity as a means of abusing someone. “Trolling, or otherwise disrupting the ability of others to debate, is not acceptable nor is consistently mentioning or making contact with others when this is not welcome.”

It makes clear to members that it wants to maximise the debate about the party, including “critical discussion” but warns that people must not feel excluded as a result.