Labour’s Dugher calls pro-Corbyn group Momentum a ‘mob’

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/dec/10/labours-dugher-calls-pro-corbyn-group-momentum-a-mob

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A shadow cabinet member, Michael Dugher, has claimed Jeremy Corbyn’s grassroots support group Momentum resembles a mob and its aggression is only matched by its stupidity.

The latest attack on the organisation by the shadow culture secretary shows there is little sign that the party moderates intend to let up in their campaign against Momentum or some of Corbyn’s closest supporters, such as Ken Livingstone.

Dugher dismisses Livingstone, saying: “Every time he opens his mouth he manages to offend large numbers of people, so maybe he should just open his mouth a little less.”

Discussing Momentum with the House, a magazine for MPs, Dugher asks why the movement still exists, saying: “The whole point is when you’ve had a leadership election, all the leadership campaigns have to pack up and come together in the Labour party. I thought that was obvious, so I can’t understand why people want to fight a leadership campaign that has already been won.

Related: Activists to harness Corbyn campaign energy with Momentum

“We have to come together as one Labour party. When Tom Watson described it as a ‘rabble’, that is what it has felt like. It occurred to me that their aggression is matched only by their stupidity. I don’t know what the point of them is.”

He said it was the task of the whole party to get back in touch with the electorate, adding there was “no need to create a new faction in the Labour party, which has been susceptible to entryists and which has at times resembled the mob”.

Rounding on Livingstone’s remarks suggesting the Paris terror attacks were a consequence of western invasions of Iraq, Dugher said: “These were sick maniacs who need to be taken on and beaten for what they are.

“Stop the justifications, stop the moral equivalence bullshit and see them for what they are. These are people who want to destroy our way of life by causing murder and mayhem on the streets of the UK. They are our enemy and we have to treat them as such.”

He also welcomed Corbyn attending the Stop the War Coalition’s Christmas fundraiser “because he can have a word with them as their former chairman and say to them ‘stop the intimidation, stop the abuse and stop the talk of deselections and going after Labour MPs who voted in a way they didn’t approve of”.

Although some MPs have called for a truce in the party’s civil war in the wake of Labour winning the Oldham West byelection, Dugher said the party should not get carried away with the result because “one swallow does not a summer make”, and that next May’s elections will be the real test of Corbyn’s leadership.

Momentum is trying to set up a dividing line between itself and other leftwing groups by saying organisations such as the Socialist party cannot attend its decision-making meetings.

It denied on Thursday it had misused the Corbyn campaign’s email list, an accusation which the Information Commissioner is investigating. Momentum said the allegation was completely unfounded and based on no evidence.

It added: “Great care was taken to ensure that the only data retained by the company set up to operate the campaign website and manage the data was the data for which we had indeed obtained the express and active permission of the individuals concerned.”

Momentum said the data policy explicitly stated that information was being collected for Corbyn’s campaign and to build a lasting network of support and debate around the ideas it inspires.

It added that all personal data provided by the party as part of the leadership campaign had been destroyed.