A little-known member of parliament is the frontrunner to become Labour’s leader – and his leftwing message has some fearing for the party’s fate

An extraordinary political tale is unfolding in Britain: a little-known politician, relegated to the margins of his party for much of his career, is now the favourite to become leader of the Labour party, the second-largest party in Britain and the government’s main opposition.



Jeremy Corbyn has been addressing increasingly sizeable audiences across the country, enthusing young new voters and Labour veterans alike with his anti-austerity, leftwing message declaring that the current economic and political status quo is neither inevitable nor desirable.

This stands in stark contrast to his rivals in the contest to succeed Ed Miliband, the Labour leader who presided over a huge loss for his party at the election in May. Corbyn’s fellow candidates Andy Burnham, Yvette Cooper and Liz Kendall are struggling to convince potential voters that their moderate policies are what the party needs to win back power from the Conservatives in five years’ time. Meanwhile, senior Labour figures have warned of the “madness” of a Jeremy Corbyn-led party. The former Labour prime minister Tony Blair, who led the party to three election victories, had a simple message to those whose heart was being swayed by Corbyn: “Get a transplant.”



Corbyn is not a sexy politician. Member of parliament for a north London constituency since 1983, he is neither a fresh new face on the national scene, nor a striking orator with a magnetic presence. This is not Britain’s Alexis Tsipras. He is an understated, thoughtful politician, happier to talk policy or discuss the people behind him than to focus on his own personal importance. Age 63, bearded and soft-spoken, Corbyn has attracted mocking headlines for his beige clothing and vests bought from the local market.

Nevertheless, he stands out from the other candidates. Burnham, Cooper and Kendall are seen by many Corbyn supporters as the same type of bland, technocratic and interchangeable career politician that puts people off from getting involved in politics, or even voting at all.



While his rivals desperately try to triangulate a centrist position that will satisfy both the party base and hypothetical voters of the kind they think Labour would need to win to gain power, Corbyn calls for renationalisation of the railways and energy companies, measures to address a burgeoning housing crisis, and increased public investment in banks, infrastructure, education and health. He also offers policies for a younger generation left reeling by cuts to education and welfare.



Some sections of the rightwing British media have barely been able to contain their glee at Corbyn’s rise, with the Daily Telegraph even openly encouraging their readers to sign up as Labour supporters to vote him in as leader, in the expectation that his leadership would lead the party to electoral doom or even to the demise of the party.



Certainly a Corbyn victory would cause tensions within the party: he very much reflects the small section of the party that has refused to accept the neoliberal consensus. He only made it on to the ballot because some politicians felt they should vote for him, despite disagreeing with him, in order to ensure a wide debate. Some of them may be regretting this now.

There are, broadly speaking, two schools of thought on what Jeremy Corbyn represents. One remains very popular with media commentators: that he represents a hysterical and childish response from the British left who, thoroughly rejected in May’s general election, have responded by turning to someone even less likely to be elected; in short, that they are wallowing in the comfort of opposition. Serious figures like the Guardian’s columnist Polly Toynbee have warned that Jeremy Corbyn as leader would be political suicide at a time when the country needs a strong and electable opposition to Conservative cuts.

The other is that after an election in which voters struggled to differentiate between the positions of the three main parties in England, and voted in huge numbers for an anti-austerity nationalist party in Scotland, Corbyn at least represents a jolt to the status quo. Some 60,000 new members have signed up to join Labour since May’s election, and among the returning members are thousands of people who have never taken an interest in politics before.

Like Bernie Sanders in the US, Corbyn is a reminder that voters today seem to crave authenticity and a challenge to to the status quo – even if, in the final analysis, that may not necessarily be an electable one.

