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30th Oct 2020

Most Brits agree with Labour’s decision to suspend Jeremy Corbyn

Most Britons think the Labour Party were right to suspend former leader Jeremy Corbyn following the EHRC report, according to a new YouGov poll

Reuben Pinder

The former Labour leader has contested his suspension

The majority of Brits believe Labour were right to suspend Jeremy Corbyn from the party following his response to the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s report into antisemitism within Labour.

Corbyn was suspended for his comments made after the report was published. The former leader, who presided over two General Elections, said in a statement posted to Facebook, “One antisemite is one too many, but the scale of the problem was also dramatically overstated for political reasons by our opponents inside and outside the party, as well as by much of the media.”

This was apparently the straw that broke the camel’s back and prompted Keir Starmer, who had stood by Corbyn in the past, to suspend him.

Corbyn will contest the decision to suspend him, but the British public seem to be taking Starmer’s side in this debate.

A snap poll conducted by YouGove on Thursday shows that 58 per cent of Brits think the suspension was justified.

Just one in eight, or 13 per cent of Brits think Labour were wrong to suspend Corbyn.

Of Labour voters, more believe the decision was right than wrong, with 46 per cent backing Starmer’s call to suspend Corbyn. Notably, though, as many as a third of Labour voters are on the fence.

The poll also found that Brits overwhelmingly think Corbyn was a bad leader of the Labour party, with 66 per cent saying so. By contrast, Starmer gets a much higher approval rating, with 46 per cent thinking he has done a good job so far.