- WELFARE
- Welfare Reform and Work Bill July 2015 – 48 Labour MPs defy orders to abstain and vote against the bill.
- The bill included plans to limit child tax credit to two children and further lower the household benefit cap.
- The then acting-leader, Harriet Harman, had argued that, following the result of the 2015 General Election, the party had to show voters that it was willing to accept welfare reforms, telling MPs, “We cannot simply say to the public, “You were wrong at the election”. However, more left-wing MPs, including Jeremy Corbyn, refused to abstain, telling the House of Commons, “We should be proud of the fact the last Labour government took 800,000 children out of poverty – but the approach of this Bill goes in the opposite direction. We cannot stay neutral on that.”
- MILITARY INTERVENTION
- Motion to authorise military action in Syria (December 2015) – 66 Labour MPs vote with the Government Before he was elected Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn was chairman of the Stop the War Coalition, which formed in 2001 in opposition to New Labour’s wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
- The left-wing of the Labour Party was critical of Tony Blair’s policy of “humanitarian intervention”, which held that the UK should be prepared to use military action to uphold human rights internationally, even when the UK was not directly threatened.
- In 2015, the left was similarly sceptical that extending military action into Syria to fight Islamic State would make the UK any safer.
- However, the centre-left, including many members of the shadow cabinet, argued that intervention was necessary for national security, and that given recent attacks committed by IS, the UK had an obligation to assist with airstrikes.
- Corbyn delivered a speech against military action, but the then shadow foreign secretary, Hilary Benn, argued in favour.
- EU
- Final reading of the European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Bill 2017 – 52 Labour MPs rebel While in recent years Labour has been viewed as considerably more pro-European than the Conservative Party, Labour’s left-wing has long been sceptical of European integration, fearing that the common market further supports and promotes inequality under capitalism, and that the loss of sovereignty would prevent UK governments from adopting more socialist economic policies.
- In the 70s, Labour was so divided over the UK’s membership of the European Economic Community, that it held a referendum to resolve the issue in which Corbyn voted to leave.
- In 2015, Corbyn announced that he would vote ‘Remain’ in the 2016 referendum, but some Labour MPs formed a campaign group called ‘Labour Leave’, to support the ‘Leave’ campaign.
- The party has been equally divided in its response to the referendum. At its final reading in the House of Commons, 52 Labour MPs defied a three-line whip to vote against the European Union (Notification of Withdrawal) Act, which gave the Government power to begin exit negotiations.
Several shadow cabinet members voted against the Bill, and some, including Rachael Maskell, Dawn Butler, and Clive Lewis, decided to resign from their shadow cabinet positions in order to defy Corbyn’s instructions. Surprisingly, Corbyn announced that he would not sack the other frontbenchers who voted against