Virgin CCTV ‘shows Corbyn walking past empty seats’ before packed train claim

The “ram-packed” train from London to Newcastle which led Jeremy Corbyn to sit on the carriage floor actually had plenty of empty and unreserved seats available, says the operator of the train he travelled on.

In the original video, which was published on the Guardian’s website, Mr Corbyn said: “This is a problem that many travellers face every day on the trains, commuters and long distance trains”.

“When Jeremy boarded the train he was unable to find unreserved seats, so he sat with other passengers in the corridor who were also unable to find a seat”.

Jeremy Corbyn has become embroiled in a furious row with Virgin Trains over claims of overcrowding and his agenda for rail nationalisation after he recorded a video on a service he took to Newcastle ahead of a leadership hustings.

More than 640,000 Labour members, registered supporters, and trade union affiliates will decide between Mr Corbyn and his challenger Owen Smith, with the victor to be announced before the party’s annual conference next month.

Owen Smith has pledged that Labour policies will be bound by party conference decisions both in opposition and in government, as members began to receive their leadership ballots. It’s not the fault of the train staff who were, of course, “absolutely brilliant” being working people; it was the system that was wrong.

The Labour Party is engulfed in a bitter internal power struggle between Corbyn’s supporters in the grassroots membership and the party’s lawmakers, who overwhelmingly rejected his leadership after Britain’s vote to leave the European Union last month.

The Labour leader chose the spot on the floor instead of upgrading to first class, it said.

The Labour leader walked past a number of unreserved and available seatsJeremy Corbyn taking his seatRelated articles Today this train is completely ram-packed.

A spokesperson for Corbyn told BuzzFeed News that Virgin’s statement was “a lie” and Corbyn even gave his seat up to a woman so she could sit down.

The 26-year-old, who was with her one-year-old daughter and son, aged six, said she had similarly been unable to find seats.

Jeremy Corbyn has thanked Labour MPs for taking on new roles in “very hard circumstances” during the chaotic aftermath of the party’s mass shadow cabinet walk-out.

The spokesman also said they were looking into whether Virgin Trains breached Information Commissioner’s Office data protection guidelines by releasing the CCTV.

Jeremy Corbyn has called for the “magic circle” of Westminster to be broken and the views of “ordinary people” to be heard, as he addressed thousands of Labour supporters at the final leadership rally before the ballot papers go out.