Corbyn after Paris

By Sebastian Payne

Will Labour’s leader stick to his pacifist principles, or bend to the public mood?

LONDON — Parliament returns on Monday after a short recess and there is going to be one topic on the minds of MPs and peers. Whereas the Treasury’s Autumn Statement on November 25 was set to be the main focus for the next few weeks, the atrocities in Paris on November 13 will be occupying politicians’ minds — in particular, how Britain can help its allies and respond to what ISIL has done a few hundred miles away. For Conservatives, most will support whatever David Cameron proposes. Labour on the other hand faces some difficult decisions about whether it will support or oppose further military action.
As expected, the prime minister has chaired several meetings, this last weekend, of Cobra — the emergency committee that gathers to formulate crisis responses. A Downing Street spokesman said after Sunday’s meeting that “we are working closely with the French authorities, through our security and intelligence agencies, police and Border Force and our Embassy in Paris,” adding that “additional patrols and policing at the border” are in place to ensure the safety of U.K. citizens. The government has understandably been focused on operational matters, but Theresa May, the home secretary, did say in an interview that there will be “lessons to be learnt from the attacks in Paris.”

The Labour party has had a public dialogue about how it intends to respond — acknowledging that it has been blamed by the government for the lack of another vote in the Commons on bombing ISIL in Syria. It has been a particularly tricky time for Jeremy Corbyn, the party’s leader, who was due to give a speech at a regional Labour conference on Saturday.
According to reports, the Labour leader was planning to explain “where his leadership has come from” and attack the foreign policy of recent governments. Pre-briefed remarks from Corbyn said “for the past 14 years, Britain has been at the center of a succession of disastrous wars that have brought devastation to large parts of the wider Middle East. They have increased, not diminished, the threats to our own national security in the process.”
Team Corbyn realized this speech would have been inappropriate, so the conference went ahead without a speech from the leader. In a statement on Saturday afternoon, Corbyn instead said, “It’s vital at a time of such tragedy and outrage not to be drawn into responses which feed a cycle of violence and hatred. We are proud to live in a multicultural and multi-faith society, and we stand for the unity of all communities”. The Corbynites are pleased with this response and argue the party should not make any radical shifts regarding military action.
“We should stick to the policy agreed at this year’s Labour party conference,” says Diane Abbott, the shadow international development secretary and a key ally of Corbyn. “This means supporting bombing in Syria with these pre-conditions: a U.N. resolution, a comprehensive plan for humanitarian assistance for displaced refugees, bombing exclusively at military targets associated with ISIL — plus any military action has to be subordinated to international diplomatic efforts to end the war.”
But not everyone in the shadow cabinet takes Corbyn’s view. Lord Charlie Falconer, the shadow justice secretary and a close ally and one-time flatmate of Tony Blair, told the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show that “everything must be done” to defeat ISIL. “I’m not urging troops on the ground but ultimately ISIL must be defeated,” Falconer said — also noting that it “can only be defeated by the international community as a whole, if possible through a U.N.-sponsored process, but if not that, then nations come together.” Hilary Benn, the shadow foreign secretary, did not rule out action either. “There has to be a comprehensive plan if you are really going to end the threat from ISIL/Daesh and that needs to come forward,” he told Sky News. “If the Government wants to bring that forward, then we would look at it”.

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For those who dislike Corbyn’s leadership, his response to the events in Paris has confirmed their worst fears. Simon Danczuk, the Labour MP for Rochdale and one of Corbyn’s most vocal critics, said in an article for The Sun on Sunday, “if we’re all working together to make Britain safer, we can’t have an opposition that appears not to take terrorism seriously. There are many Labour moderates who don’t like the tone being set by Jeremy Corbyn on national security — and it’s time we made clear where we stand.”
But the most interesting response has come from Dan Jarvis, the Labour MP for Barnsley Central and a former solider. He was urged to run in the leadership contest following Labour’s defeat in May’s general election, but he declined to throw his beret into the ring, saying “it’s not the right time for my family”. But Jarvis is still frequently mooted as a future leader, so every sentence he utters publicly is carefully watched.
Those who believe he is the right man to lead the party and return it to the center ground will be pleased with his response. In an article for the Daily Mirror, Jarvis said the battle with ISIL “could yet be the defining test for our generation.” Like the other moderates, he says there needs to be a “calm assessment of these atrocities and the implications for our country” and “ministers must ensure that every possible action is being taken to safeguard our security and prevent an attack of this nature on the U.K.”
Jarvis says that a “collective response” to the Paris attacks should be “borne out of a coherent strategy:” “not a series of piecemeal interventions but a clear plan that draws on all means at our disposal: military, diplomatic, economic and cultural, leveraging both our hard and soft power.”
Although Jarvis’ proposals aren’t particularly radical, the fact he has spoken up is significant — giving a voice to many Labour MPs who are concerned about the leadership’s stance on ISIL and military action. Marcus Roberts, a Labour strategist, says, “Just because Jeremy Corbyn is our leader, it does not mean Labour has become a party of peaceniks. There is a strong history of liberal interventionism and Dan Jarvis is giving a voice to that. Just as it was wrong to say the whole party was in favour of the Iraq war under Tony Blair, it is equally wrong to say everyone opposes Syrian intervention under Corbyn.”
If the government does bring together a new plan for taking on ISIL in the coming weeks, it will be interesting to see whether Corbyn sticks to his principles and if Labour MPs rally around the leader. If this happens, Dan Jarvis could emerge as the man with an alternative plan — and the figure the party needs to find unity in a time of crisis.