Jeremy Corbyn’s closest ally has called for Sir Richard Branson to be stripped of his knighthood, days after his company Virgin released CCTV footage casting doubt on the Labour leader’s claim of train overcrowding.



John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, used an interview in the Sunday Mirror to call Branson, who lives in the Caribbean, a “tax exile who thinks he can try and intervene and undermine our democracy”.



He also repeated his call for the former BHS owner Sir Philip Green, whom he called a “freeloader”, to lose his title as part of a shakeup of the honours system. He said those who were not “acting in the spirit of our country” should lose their honours.

McDonnell’s comments follow days of acrimony between Labour and Virgin after Corbyn’s team released a clip, filmed earlier this month, showing the Labour leader sitting on the floor of a Virgin train claiming he could not find a seat on a “ram-packed” train and highlighting his policy to nationalise railways.

On Tuesday Virgin released CCTV – which Branson tweeted – that it said showed Corbyn’s team walking past rows of vacant seats before filming the clip.

McDonnell, who is leading Corbyn’s campaign for the Labour leadership, said: “It should be a simple choice for the mega-rich. Run off to tax exile if you want. But you leave your titles and your honours behind you when you go.”

There is no suggestion that the tax affairs of Branson or Green are illegal.

Owen Smith, Corbyn’s rival for the Labour leadership, said in an LBC interview that the shadow chancellor was proposing to punish Branson for “telling the truth”.

McDonnell also called for Green, who lives in Monaco, to lose his title. “Why should Philip Green, who ran BHS into the ground and paid his wife in Monaco £1bn to avoid UK tax, be honoured with a ‘Sir’?” he asked. “The whole honours system is cheapened when freeloaders like Green are given awards.”

He added: “If you have been found to be a tax avoider or a tax exile then you should not be on the honours list to begin with. And you should certainly have it stripped from you if you subsequently have been found to be not acting in the spirit of our country.”

Sir Philip Green. Photograph: Bobby Yip/Reuters

Instead, he said, awards should go to “unsung heroes who keep our public services running, or devote a lifetime to local communities”.

A spokesman for McDonnell said: “John believes that it should be for parliament to ultimately decide who is or who is not stripped of their title, if enough members of the public campaign for it.



“But he would not support tax exiles or businessmen who mistreat their employees retaining their titles.”

The Labour MP John Woodcock wrote on Twitter: “Dare to question Saint Jeremy’s version of the truth? John McDonnell will strip you of your knighthood ...”

Smith said he had not heard about McDonnell’s comments before his LBC interview. He told Andrew Castle: “It seems a bit much, to be honest. I think he was merely pointing out the reality that Jeremy didn’t need to sit on the floor, so I can’t imagine we would strip somebody’s honours for telling the truth.”

Smith used the interview to attack Corbyn’s claim that he didn’t consider himself wealthy, saying the Labour leader’s combined £138,000 pay packet meant he was “well and truly in the top 1% in the country”. Smith’s own £70,000 MP’s salary put him in the top 10%, he added, “and I think we have to be realistic about that”.

Corbyn should be held responsible for the “uglier” tone of debate in the Labour party, Smith added. “We’ve had an uglier debate within Labour in the last 11 months than we’ve ever had in my life, and I don’t think Jeremy can escape some of the responsibility for that, as he has been the leader during this period,” he said.

Smith said internal polling showed his campaign was “making real inroads” against Corbyn in the leadership campaign, adding, “I’m fighting as hard as I can.”