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Labour leadership debate: Jeremy Corbyn and Owen Smith in Cardiff – live
Labour leadership debate: Jeremy Corbyn and Owen Smith in Cardiff – live
(35 minutes later)
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Corybn admits he could have chosen his words more carefully when he spoke the day after the EU referendum about Article 50. However, he maintains that the process of leaving the EU will happen eventually - something that Smith disagrees with.
Next question is on immigration. Do the candidates recognise that people feel uneasy about immigration?
7.29pm BST
Smith concedes there are pressures on social services, but investment is the answer to solving these problems.
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Corbyn says he recognises the unease but that we live in a multicultural society and that the UK has benefitted from immigrants.
Smith says Brexit was a “monumental” mistake. He doesn’t blame Corbyn for the result but the party could have worked harder in the campaign. He wants a second referendum or a general election to decide the issue of the UK’s EU membership.
8.01pm BST
“The country was lied to by the Brexiteers,” Smith says.
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For 30 years Corbyn didn’t believe in the European Union and now we’re on the sidelines, adds Smith: “Under me we will fight much harder.”
Channel 4 News polticial correspondent Michael Crick tweets:
7.22pm BST
Some jeers as Owen Smith justifies voting for Trident by saying his hero is (Welshman) Nye Bevan
19:22
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20:00
New Statesman political editor George Eaton tweets:
New Statesman political editor George Eaton tweets:
Smith says on current trajectory Labour will poll 22% at the next election. #LabourLeadership
No chance of Trident abolition becoming Labour policy under conference rules (unions have 50% of vote). #LabourLeadership
Smith emphasising that Labour are 14 points behind the Tories. Expect most members will blame MPs, not Corbyn. #LabourLeadership
7.59pm BST
19:59
Next question: Trident renewal.
Corbyn says he voted against the renewal, to loud cheers from the audience. Renewing the nuclear deterrent is not moving towards a world free of nuclear weapons, he adds.
Smith is in favour of a world without nuclear weapons – but argues that the UK needs to retain a nuclear deterrent because of heightened threats from countries such as Russia in what has become a more dangerous world.
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Corbyn accuses some Labour MPs of “silly, childish behaviour”.
Austerity has failed and it’s time to invest in this country, Smith says. “It’s a question of whether we can afford not to do this.”
Smith says 172 Labour MPs have no confidence in Corbyn as leader. “We are fighting like ferrets in a sack.”
Corbyn responds: “You can’t cut your way to prosperity.” He says Labour has made mistakes but has changed and wants the party to go further down the road to minimise “grotesque” levels of inequality in the country.
The parliamentary party is not the entirety of the Labour movement, Corbyn says.
7.50pm BST
Smith reminds Corbyn that he was the shadow work and pensions secretary who won the fight against tax credit changes.
19:50
7.17pm BST
Smith says 2 million Labour voters would rather have Theresa May as prime minister. “That has to be a wake-up call to the party,” he adds.
19:17
MPs should recognise that the structure of the party has changed, Corbyn says.
Smith says the Labour leader has a duty to hold together what is a coalition. “Jeremy has not been able to hold us together in Westminster. The only people who will benefit from that is the Tories.”
7.14pm BST
19:14
Corbyn blames the recent resignations from the Labour front bench for the party’s standing in the polls.
Smith agrees that the party needs to be united: “We’ve never looked more disunited.”
Corbyn says the party’s membership is growing and doesn’t understand how Smith can complain about disunity when he resigned from the front bench.
Smith responds “I wasn’t part of any coup in the Labour party” and adds that shadow John McDonnell was happy to see the party split.
7.09pm BST
19:09
We’re underway: the first question for Owen Smith. Is he the leader that Theresa May would least like to face at the next election?
He says he thinks he is: “We’ve got to carry the fight to the Tories much more vigorously.”
Jeremy Corbyn says May doesn’t understand the feelings of ordinary people’s feelings across the country. “When we work together we do defeat the Tories.”
Big applause for Smith when he says that Labour is not defeating the Tories given that the party is 14 percentage points behind the government. “I want us to be radical - in government,” he says.
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The two MPs will set out their stall for the leadership in the 90-minute debate.
How to convince voters that Labour is fiscally responsible is the next question.
It will be the first time the two have faced each other in the contest and they will be asked questions by an audience of several hundred people.
Corybn says measures such as a very large housing programme is needed – for example, building 1m homes in the next five years and providing lifetime tenancies for council houses.
Ahead of the showdown, both politicians have been touring the country laying out their vision for the party and trying to galvanise support.
Jeremy Corbyn dismissed claims by Owen Smith that the party is “teetering on the edge of a precipice” and could split unless there is a new leader.
Corbyn suggested rebel MPs owe the party a debt of gratitude and would not break away to form a rival movement. “I’m sure no Labour MP would even dream of walking away from the family of the Labour movement – the family of the Labour party that helped to put them in parliament,” he told a cheering audience in Dagenham, east London.
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Welcome to our live coverage of the first Labour leadership debate between Jeremy Corbyn and Owen Smith, which is being held in Cardiff.
Owen Smith says it is time to “stop the culture of greed” with “good old-fashioned socialist policies”.
The party will hold nine such debates over the coming weeks ahead of voting that starts later this month and ends on 21 September.
Without being able to win, we won’t be able to do anything other than protest, Smith says: “Otherwise it’s just hot air.”
The result will be announced at a special conference in Liverpool on Saturday 24 September.
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More details about the process here.
at 7.52pm BST
You can also watch the debate online.
7.41pm BST
19:41
Smith says Britain needs to be reindustrialised – something Corbyn has also spoken about.
How will it make the country more competitive? We need to do more to develop ideas in Britain, Corbyn says: “We need a different strategy.”
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Sky political correspondent Sophy Ridge tweets:
Owen Smith to Corbyn: "I don't think you spoke with the passion that some of us in the Labour Party feel"on EU referendum #LabourLeadership
