Richard Burgon MP: Attacks on Stop the War are Proxy Attacks on Jeremy Corbyn

Shadow treasury minister Richard Burgon told BBC: “attacks on Stop the War are proxy attacks on Jeremy Corbyn.”

Shadow treasury minister Richard Burgon, BBC, 13 December 2015.

Labour frontbencher Richard Burgon took on Jeremy Corbyn’s critics head on Sunday, accusing those who view Tony Blair as the moderate of living in a “topsy-turvy” world.

The shadow treasury minister argued that “demonising” Mr Corbyn for opposing the bombing of Syria while “pretending that Mr Blair and others “got it right in Iraq” was wrong.

Speaking on the BBC Sunday Politics programme, Mr Burgon said: “It’s part of an open democratic process and people shouldn’t be demonised for being part of it and Jeremy Corbyn certainly shouldn’t be demonised for being part of it.

“It’s a topsy-turvy world we’re in when attending Stop the War events is controversial. We’re still pretending that Tony Blair and others got it right in Iraq is seen as moderate. That’s a topsy-turvy world indeed.”

He said the attacks on Stop the War were “proxy attacks” on the Labour leader.

“When Charles Kennedy was speaking at the 2003 demonstration against the Iraq War which two million people attended, the Liberal Democrats and Charles Kennedy weren’t attacked for that and quite rightly so.”

And Blair’s own deputy prime minister John Prescott waded into the row yesterday, saying that some Labour members were continuing “a war that they lost.”

He branded those who had failed to accept Mr Corbyn’s leadership as “bitterites.”

But Mr Prescott did say the Labour leader should put party commitments ahead of “representing protest movements.”

Mr Corbyn refused to drop out of a Stop the War fundraiser last week despite sniping from rightwingers.

He did was not present at this weekend’s protests against Syrian airstrikes, but sent a message of solidarity to Stop the War chair Andrew Murray to be read out at the day’s rally.

It said: “The anti-war movement has been a vital force at the heart of our democracy.

“The attacks on it as somehow illegitimate are an attempt to close down democratic debate and campaigning.

“We in Parliament will hold this government to account for the conduct of their campaign — and step up the pressure to bring the conflict to an end.”

Source: Morning Star