UK’s Labour says Corbyn has automatic right to defend leadership

Corbyn, who received one of the largest mandates for the leadership from Labour members and supporters in 2015, has been fighting to be on the ballot following an attempt to oust him as party leader.

The leader of Britain’s opposition Labour Party Jeremy Corbyn called on Tuesday for calm among the party’s supporters after the office of a lawmaker challenging his leadership was vandalised, adding that he had also received death threats this week.

The parliamentarian from Wales, who resigned from Corbyn’s shadow cabinet last month along with dozens of other frontbenchers, will need the support of 51 of his colleagues to be eligible.

“It is bullying. It has absolutely no place in politics in the United Kingdom and it needs to end”.

Paul Stuart, a Seacombe councillor and co-vice chairman of the Constituency Labour Party (CLP), said Ms Eagle had been on the receiving end of homophobic emails and telephone calls which he described as “really vile”. He said that the MP’s primary concern now was for her staff and her constituents.

Corbyn was forced into the leadership challenge after a majority of Labour MPs passed a “no confidence” vote in his leadership.

What are Angela Eagle’s odds?

Branch secretary Ros Jackson, who is also a Town and District councillor, told the Leader: “Jeremy Corbyn’s vision resonates with a lot of people because he never stops thinking about ordinary people and what people in this country are enduring”.

The move came after a brick was thrown through the window of her office in Wallasey, near Liverpool in northwest England.

She told BBC Two’s Newsnight: “I would say to the nine million Labour voters out there, there’s two days next week when you can actually pay £25, help save the Labour Party, make our democracy work and help me heal our country”.

The so-called Beast of Bolsover said it was “cut and dry” that Mr Corbyn would be able to stand in the contest.

“It is an absolutely disgraceful situation that you can not take part in a democracy without having this kind of threats, the violence of it, the vile nature of the abuse that is being given to Angela Eagle and to the other members of her staff and to those who support her is completely unacceptable in any day and age”, she said.

Jeremy Corbyn condemned het action, stating that violence and threats have no place in Labour’s politics.

Registered supporter status, which gives people a one-off vote if they pay a fee, will cost £25 this time round instead of the £3 payment that saw thousands of Mr Corbyn’s supporters sign up in the run-up to last September’s vote.

Unite, the party’s biggest financial backer, commissioned its own legal advice from Michael Mansfield QC, which found that Corbyn’s name should be included.