How the Labour Right Worked Against Democracy to Oust Jeremy Corbyn – and Were Rewarded
The story of Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party is not simply one of internal disagreement or factional rivalry. It is a tale of how a determined segment of the party’s right wing undermined democratic processes to remove a leader they despised and were handsomely rewarded for their efforts.
When Corbyn won the leadership in 2015, it was on a wave of unprecedented grassroots enthusiasm. Hundreds of thousands of people joined Labour, inspired by the promise of a politics that spoke to social justice, anti-austerity, and peace. His victory, and the subsequent increase in party membership, should have been seen as a democratic mandate. But for the Labour right, it was a threat to their entrenched power and influence.
From the outset, elements of the party bureaucracy and many right-wing MPs treated Corbyn not as the elected leader of the party but as an interloper to be removed by any means necessary. They sought to delegitimise his leadership at every turn, leaking stories to the press, amplifying internal disputes, and painting the party under Corbyn as irredeemably divided — often a division of their own making.
Perhaps most damning were the revelations in leaked internal reports, which exposed how senior figures within Labour HQ actively worked against the party’s success during the 2017 general election. While activists and candidates fought tirelessly for every vote, some officials, supposedly neutral stewards of the party, were found to have diverted resources away from winnable seats and created a parallel campaign operation to bolster the right of the party. These actions were not merely petty sabotage; they were a calculated effort to prevent a Corbyn-led Labour government.
Time and again, grassroots members voted overwhelmingly in support of Corbyn and his policies, but the machinery of the party was used to frustrate this democratic will. From purges of left-wing members under questionable pretexts to bending rules to exclude leadership candidates aligned with the left, the Labour right manipulated internal processes to consolidate their hold on the party.
Their reward? With Corbyn gone and Keir Starmer installed as leader, many of these same figures were elevated to positions of prominence. Former critics of Corbyn were given peerages, party jobs, and greater influence over policy direction. The internal culture shifted decisively away from the values that had energised hundreds of thousands of new members, towards a managerial centrism more palatable to the establishment.
The irony is stark: those who accused Corbyn supporters of undermining party unity were, in reality, the architects of division. In their quest to protect their own power, they sidelined democracy within the party and betrayed the hopes of a movement that had sought to transform British politics for the better.
History may yet judge them harshly. For now, their success in dismantling the Corbyn project stands as a sobering lesson in how power, when threatened, will go to extraordinary lengths to reassert itself — even at the expense of democracy.
Their lies and propaganda were bought and paid for.
In the words of Jim Royal, “Democracy, my arse.”
