Labour leader says progressive parties need to break away from establishment to prevent populists filling political void

This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

The populist right are “political parasites feeding on people’s concerns and worsening conditions”, Jeremy Corbyn has told a gathering of European socialist and progressive parties.

In a speech in Prague, the Labour leader said that unless progressives broke with a “failed economic and political establishment” the far right would fill the gap.

The populist right has been emboldened by the vote for Brexit and the success of Donald Trump in the US, while the far-right Freedom party is challenging for the presidency in Austria this weekend and Marine le Pen’s Front National is expecting to do well in French elections next year.

Corbyn told the Party of European Socialists Council that while the populist right had identified many of the correct problems at a time of growing insecurity and declining living standards, the solutions offered were “toxic dead-ends” of the past.

“They are political parasites feeding on people’s concerns and worsening conditions, blaming the most vulnerable for society’s ills instead of offering a way for taking back real control of our lives from the elites who serve their own interests,” he said.

“But unless progressive parties and movements break with a failed economic and political establishment, it is the siren voices of the populist far right who will fill that gap.”

The Labour leader said economic conditions had proved fertile ground for the populist right to exploit.

“We know the gap between rich and poor is widening, we know living standards are stagnating or falling and insecurity is growing, we know that many people rightly feel left behind by the forces unleashed by globalisation; powerless in the face of deregulated corporate power,” he said.

Corbyn repeated his call for the government to guarantee the rights of EU citizens living in Britain before it opened formal negotiations to withdraw from the EU.

He also announced he was inviting leaders of socialist and progressive parties to a conference in London to discuss the best outcomes for both Britain and the remaining EU.

“Labour is pushing for Brexit negotiations to be carried out in a transparent manner, in a spirit that aims to find a deal that works for all people across our continent,” he said.