LBC Exclusive: Jeremy Corbyn Attacks Lack Of Democracy In European Union

22 February 2019, 07:49

LBC has uncovered a clip of Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn accusing the European Union of having a "democratic deficit".

The clip, taken from a socialist conference in 2011 in Portugal, shows the extent that Mr Corbyn has been a strong critic of the EU.

At the conference, he said: "What we have in Europe is this massive democratic deficit of a straitjacket of a European policy put down through Maastrict and the European Central Bank and the Euro currency which doesn't defend living standards, doesn't defend welfare states, doesn't defend health services, but does protect the market, does protect banking interests and can't control what it does.

"We need to make some democratic demands all across this continent of ours."

Mr Corbyn also criticised a decision taken by Gordon Brown in 1997 that the Bank of England independently control interest rate and said countries within NATO should not have to spend 2% of their GDP on defence.

In response to the clip, a Labour spokesman said: "Jeremy was speaking out against the austerity that the IMF, the EU and the world's bankers were forcing on the people of Europe at the time and calling for people to work across borders to defeat austerity and build an economy that works for the many not the few.

"He is proud of his longstanding record of campaigning for internationalism, social justice and for an investment-led economy.

"Jeremy has a long and proud record of opposition to disastrous foreign interventions and supports Labour's policy of spending 2% of GDP on defence."