Photo by Getty Labour leftists turn anti-EU over Greece The Greek crisis is beginning to convert Britain’s left to the wisdom of a Brexit.

Britain’s Labour Party campaigned as the party of Brussels in the May elections — and was thumped by Tory Prime Minister David Cameron.

Now defeated, disorientated, and internally divided as its lengthy leadership race drags on, many Labour MPs and influential leftwing figures are toying with Euroskepticism, appalled by the way the EU has handled the crisis in Greece.

“There has been abject complacency amongst pro-Europeans on the left,” said Claude Moraes, a Labour MEP and head of the European Parliament’s justice and home affairs committee. “Grassroots Labour support for Europe is quite strong. But it’s being massively tested by the austerity narrative, which is austerity doesn’t work and what’s happening is destroying Greece.”

Just a couple of months ago, the main pitch of the now former Labour leader Ed Miliband to business was that he would not hold an in/out referendum on the U.K.’s EU membership. But Miliband, now a much-reduced figure but still an MP, took to Twitter to express his frustration over Greece despite doubts over Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras.

(...) bullying and denial of need for debt restructuring by eurozone flies in face of views of IMF, US Administration, economics and democracy (...)

“Very troubling to see eurozone actions over last week,” tweeted Miliband. “Tsipras tactics very odd. But bullying and denial of need for debt restructuring by eurozone flies in face of views of IMF, US Administration, economics and democracy.”

Those MPs gunning to replace Miliband or take top positions within the party were not so restrained.

Jeremy Corbyn, a hard-left MP running with unexpected strength for Labour leadership, has called the EU an organization, “that continues to pursue its central goal of being a place where big business has free rein to operate.”

As the results came in from Greece’s Sunday referendum he tweeted: “The people of Greece have spoken, austerity has failed them and Europe must recognize this and end the human suffering.”

Diane Abbott, a left-wing MP running for selection as Labour candidate for mayor of London, also tweeted her anger at the EU: “If Greek people have voted No in referendum, they will have successfully resisted a crude attempt at regime change by EU ‪#CancelGreekDebt.”

This creeping disgust at the actions of Brussels and Berlin in Greece is also shared by those on the right of the party.

John Mann, an MP, tweeted: “Looks like Greece has stood and been counted with a huge NO vote. High time the EU fantasists had a reality check.”

Beyond Labour, the former leader of the anti-austerity Scottish National Party Alex Salmond (who once advocated for an independent Scotland to join the euro) tweeted: “Well done to the people of Greece. European leaders should now respond constructively to the democratic voice of the Greek people.”

Left-wing intellectuals are also indignant over Greece.

Owen Jones, a campaigning journalist and Labour-supporting activist with a large following made a video — replete with anti-European Central Bank imagery — saying he wanted to open a debate on whether the left should remain committed to the EU: “I can’t possibly imagine myself [in the forthcoming in/out referendum] campaigning for the EU as it stands.”

Other activists seemed to agree, posting on social media that they would be ready to campaign for Brexit if the EU “destroys Greece.”

London-based intellectuals with sway over left-wing opinion such as the academic David Graeber, a key figure in the anti-capitalist US Occupy Movement, tweeted: “Jeroen Dijsselbloem [head of the Eurogroup] insisting more Greek citizens die rather than admit austerity failed, is literally a murderer.”

Labour now has its own Euroskeptic group, Labour for Britain. The Greek crisis has hardened their views.

Now the euro is a straitjacket and the Greek people are told they have no choice but austerity with no end in sight (...)

“It is now clear that the guiding objective of those running the EU is the preservation of their ‘project’ at the expense of economic and human suffering,” said co-chair Kate Hoey. “Now the euro is a straitjacket and the Greek people are told they have no choice but austerity with no end in sight. I salute the courage of the Greek nation in voting ‘NO’ to the EU’s conditions.”

The shift is actually a return to Labour’s roots; it has not always been a pro-EU party.

“It’s a myth to suggest there has always been consensus on the left over the EU,” said Ellie O’Hagan, activist and analyst from the Center for Labour and Social Studies, which is funded by Britain’s trade union movement. “It’s true that the liberal left has always advocated for the European project, but many influential figures who align more with socialism than liberalism are opposed to it.”

This memory is now buried; one of the many legacies of Tony Blair’s “New Labour.” But in 1983, the party campaigned in the general election to leave the then European Community, and in 1975 during a special party congress delegates voted 2-1 to withdraw from the European Community, which the U.K. had joined two years earlier.

That dormant tendency to see the European Union as a tool of neo-liberal economics may now be returning.

“The events in Greece have no doubt emboldened the anti-EU left to be more emphatic about its position,” explained O’Hagan, “and have probably won around many on the left who were not staunchly opposed to the EU but could also appreciate the flaws of the project from a left-wing perspective.”