A combative Jeremy Corbyn has said he welcomes the tough byelections triggered by the resignations of two Labour MPs as an opportunity to challenge the government, as his ally John McDonnell said the party had had a good week.

Tristram Hunt, a fierce critic of Corbyn’s leadership, announced on Friday that he was stepping down as the MP for Stoke-on-Trent Central, a constituency where Ukip came second in 2015 and that voted heavily for Brexit.



His resignation to run the Victoria and Albert Museum in London followed that of Jamie Reed in December, whose Copeland constituency in Cumbria is home to the Sellafield nuclear plant.

In a robust appearance on the BBC’s The Andrew Marr Show on Sunday, Corbyn said he welcomed the forthcoming contests. “It’s an opportunity to challenge the government on the NHS. It’s an opportunity to challenge the government on the chaos of Brexit. It’s an opportunity to challenge the government on the housing shortage,” he said.

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He said the resignations had not affected his determination to keep leading Labour. “I look in the mirror every day, and I think, let’s get out there and try to create a society where there are opportunities for all,” he said.

Labour is still languishing far behind the Conservatives in the opinion polls, but Corbyn said he believed the party’s ratings would start to bounce back as the public realised the full state of the crisis in the NHS.

He said Labour’s priority would be to cancel planned cuts to corporation tax and put the cash into social care.

The two mid-term resignations have raised concerns at Westminster that more Labour MPs disillusioned with Corbyn’s leadership could follow suit. “There won’t be loads, but there will be some, I’m sure,” a senior party insider said.

The Wigan MP Lisa Nandy, who is sometimes talked about as a future Labour leadership contender, told BBC Radio 5 Live on Sunday she planned to spend more time in her constituency in the coming months, as a response to the feeling among some voters that their voices were not being heard.

Asked if she thought other colleagues would follow Reed and Hunt, Nandy said: “People are thinking very seriously about what they can actually contribute personally to the political process.”

She added that Labour was in the difficult position of trying to speak for both sides of the Brexit divide. “A lot of my colleagues are spending a lot more time outside the Westminster bubble and in their constituencies,” Nandy said.

Corbyn’s appearance on the Sunday television interview circuit was part of a new year relaunch, in which his advisers have sought to harness his unpolished style and willingness to reject the political mainstream. He has floated the idea of capping excessive corporate pay and nationalising failing care homes – ideas that Corbyn’s team believe will be popular with the public.

McDonnell, in an interview with Sky News’s Sophy Ridge, said he believed the relaunch was going well. “I think this week’s been pretty good,” he said. “On the issues that we wanted to get across on the day, the issue around pay was raised and he answered honestly, in the authentic way he always does.

“We drew people into a debate that they’d never had before, or not for a long time anyway, and we drew them in on our own terms.”

But an attempt to shift the party’s line on immigration, which many backbench MPs believe is key to winning back votes in working-class constituencies, floundered as Corbyn appeared to back away from the idea of limits on free movement.

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The shadow foreign secretary, Emily Thornberry, when asked to clarify Labour’s position by ITV’s Robert Peston, said: “We’re not going to die in a ditch about it, it’s up for negotiation, but Labour’s principle has always been that the economy is the most important thing.”

Diane Abbott, one of Corbyn’s closest allies, has struck a different tone since the Brexit vote, warning that by caving in to demands for a tougher stance on immigration, the party risked becoming “Ukip-lite”.

Corbyn sought to sidestep the issue on Sunday, emphasising the impact of exploitative employers on low-paid workers, rather than the scale of immigration, saying: “Let’s not blame migrants for the problems we have.

“What I have been talking about all along is the question of ending the grotesque exploitation and the undercutting that goes on. Are we going to cut ourselves off from Europe completely? I don’t think so.”

He also hit out at the representation of Labour and his leadership in the media. Corbyn said it had been unfair and he would like to see a “right of reply”.

No date has been set for the two byelections, but both are expected to be held within weeks, and could give the clearest indication yet of how the referendum has shaken up British politics.