Supporters listen to speeches at Jeremy Corbyn’s campaign launch event at the Brickworks Community Centre on Wednesday night

JEREMY Corbyn officially launched his campaign as an independent candidate in the general election as supporters packed into a community centre to hear him speak.

The former Labour Party leader pledged a “campaign of hope” at the Brickworks Community Centre in Crouch Hill.

Mr Corbyn, who has represented Islington North in parliament for 40 years, told around 200 local activists: “Of hope of the kind of world we can live in, of hope for young people, of hope for all generations.

“That means difficult conversations, but above all it means determin­ation. So, my friends, never be afraid to hope, never be embarrassed to be inspired… think big, and think wide.”

Mr Corbyn promised to use his position if he returns to the House of Commons to demand rent-controls, a fully-public NHS, public ownership of water and energy, abolition of the two-child benefit cap, and support for people in Palestine.

He added that his decision to stand was motivated by a belief in democracy.

Mr Corbyn said: “I’m standing for democracy. Democracy has been denied. Islington North Labour members were denied any vote to decide who their MP is or who their candidate is.”

He added: “And if you shut down the voice of people, that democratic voice, then you’ve got problems. And the problems are that people don’t like it. They want their voice to be heard and we are making sure our voice is heard.”

He had already told residents in Islington North of his intentions to stand as an independent in the pages of last week’s Islington Tribune.

Mr Corbyn is now expelled from the party as a consequence of standing as an independent.

Whatever happens next, this was a historic moment in Islington’s political history as the man who has represented Islington North for four decades now stands without the red Labour rosette.

He was effectively blocked from standing as a Labour candidate again when the party’s current leader Sir Keir Starmer led a National Executive Committee (NEC) motion against him.

Mr Starmer, who served as the Brexit frontman for Labour in Mr Corbyn’s shadow cabinet, has since made several comments denying he was ever friends with him and said last week that Mr Corbyn’s days of influencing his party’s policy were over.

Mr Corbyn was still a member of the Labour Party but was sitting in the House of Commons as an independent MP having lost the Labour whip when the motion barred him from being the candidate.

Mr Starmer had punished him for his response to the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s inquiry in 2020 which investigated complaints of anti-Semitism in the party were handled.

Mr Corbyn had said “one anti-Semite is one too many, but 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”. Mr Starmer said this comment played down the problem.

Mr Starmer had himself commissioned a separate inquiry into the issue, led by Martin Forde KC. The findings of that investigation said: “Some anti-Corbyn elements of the party seized on antisemitism as a way to attack Jeremy Corbyn, and his supporters saw it simply as an attack on the leader and his faction – with both ‘sides’ thus weaponising the issue and failing to recognise the seriousness of anti-Semitism.”

In an interview with the Tribune at the launch event, Mr Corbyn added that his candidacy represented an “important moment” for the future of left-wing politics and the Labour Party.

Jeremy Corbyn addresses the audience

Mr Corbyn said: “Nothing hinges on any one moment but this is obviously an important moment for democracy in the Labour Party, and also democracy in the community.

“I would never say never on things but it seems to me that we’ve crossed quite a big moment when a party in opposition, potentially going into government, seems to have struggles just to cope with democracy in itself.

“What really is at the heart of it of course is the issue of democratic choices. I believe our society is deeply divided, is very unfair ­– there’s huge levels of inequality and it’s up to the Labour Party to offer an alternative.

“I know it’s not easy, I’ve been there, I’ve done it but you have to make the offer of a different way of running society. We can’t be billionaires and food banks.”

Of his own offer, he added: “So, [if you vote for me] you’re not going to get a Tory stooge, you’re going to get the very opposite. You’re going to get somebody that believes is social justice, equality, human rights and above all the empowerment of ordinary people.”

He said that the decision making structure within the Labour party meant that it could not be held accountable for the way it operates its selection process.

“The Parliamentary Labour Party makes its own rules”, Mr Corbyn said. “It’s like a golf club, it decides what it does itself, it’s not even open to legal action.”

Mr Corbyn added that he felt the Labour party had become unwelcoming of a spectrum of opinion and said this had been revealed further by attempts to block Diane Abbott from standing again in Hackney and Stoke Newington.

She had the Labour whip restored this week but the first black female MP in the country’s history has faced days of mixed messages as to whether she can put her name forward as a candidate at the elections.

Hundreds were protesting outside Hackney Town Hall on Wednesday evening with warnings that they could not vote for the Labour Party if Ms Abbott was not allowed to be a candidate.

“I see a depressing intolerance in the way in which the Labour party operates at the moment,” he said.

“We now hear about other candidates being removed right on the eve of the election.”

Mr Corbyn said that if elected he will set up community events in which he would report back to constituents about what he was working on in parliament.

Asked whether he might struggle to be heard in the Commons without the infrastructure of a big political party, he said: “I’d say parliament needs voices. People who are prepared to speak out, and prepared to speak up for things.

“Actually as an independent, you have more opportunities, more voices, and you won’t have party whips telling you that you can do this or you can’t do that.

“Think of the great MPs who have achieved great things on their own in parliament. Tam Dalyell, yes he was a Labour MP but he was independently minded and I think brought about great truth and honesty on the case of the General Belgrano. So you want MPs who speak out and I’ve been there a long time and I fought the case of the Guildford Four, the Birmingham Six and so much more and I did that in an atmosphere in the Labour Party that was at the very least tolerant to taking up those kind of issues. If I’m in parliament, don’t worry I won’t be silent.”

Mr Corbyn’s campaign was endorsed at the launch by several speakers including Mohammed Kozbar, the chair of the Finsbury Park mosque, NHS campaigner Jan Pollock, and Islington-born junior doctor Rohi Malik.

Dr Malik said: “Jeremy has always represented the best interests of all of us. Jeremy has always given us hope.”

She added: “His relentless commitment to changing things for the better thoroughly inspired me, my sisters, and our peers as we grew up and impacted how we interact with the world for the better.”

Mr Kozbar added: “We wouldn’t find a better MP than Jeremy Corbyn, who cares about people, who looks after people.

“I know when he comes to the mosque for example, and I’m sure wherever he goes, when people ask for help and support, he’d never say no. He’s never said no to anyone when they ask him for support.”

Mr Corbyn said at the launch that he would not be getting into personal attacks on any of the other candidates at the election.

“I don’t get in the gutter in politics or for anything else for that matter,” he said.

“If I’m elected I’ll be very grateful to the people of Islington North and I’ll repay that by working as their MP.”

Candidates in Islington

We are updating a list of everybody who has declared that they will be standing in the borough at the July 4 general election

ISLINGTON NORTH
Jeremy Corbyn (Independent)
Praful Nargund (Labour)
Sheridan Kates (Green)
Vikas Aggarwal (Lib Dems)
Martin Nelson (Reform UK)

ISLINGTON SOUTH & FINSBURY
Emily Thornberry (Labour)
Terry Stacy (Lib Dem)
Carne Ross (Green)
Max Nelson (Reform UK)
Jake Painter (SDP)
Nasreen Najeeb (Workers Party)