Labour Under Corbyn "Rotten To The Core" Says Former Labour MP

23 February 2019, 12:41 | Updated: 23 February 2019, 12:54

One of the MPs who quit the Labour Party to join the newly-formed Independent Group has hit out at Jeremy Corbyn's reminder that they were elected to carry out Labour manifestos, calling the party leader a hypocrite.

Joan Ryan said she was not going to put herself up for re-election in a by-election after quitting the Labour Party.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said in a speech on the day she resigned that he hoped the group "realise they were elected to Parliament on a manifesto".

But speaking to Matt Frei, the former Labour MP said that Mr Corbyn's leadership had made the party "rotten to the core".

"I have done everything I can to fight for those traditional Labour values in the Labour Party," she said.

"I have no faith that it will ever be able to do that because I believe Jeremy Corbyn's leadership has made the Labour Party rotten to the core.

"I can not say to people that he is fit to be Prime Minister".

Ms Ryan added that she thought that Mr Corbyn was hypocritical for telling those MPs who quit that they were elected on Labour manifestos after he was elected on promises he "rarely voted with".

"When he talks about manifestos, he was elected on many times under many different Labour leaders and I don't think he ever took any notice whatsoever of what the manifesto was and certainly very rarely voted with it," she said.

"I don't understand why he stood for Labour for all those years," she added.