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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) | |
8.43pm BST | |
20:43 | |
That’s the end of the first Labour leadership debate. Only five more to go... | |
8.38pm BST | |
20:38 | |
Jeremy Corbyn says Labour lost the last general election because it offered “austerity-lite” and abstaining on the welfare reform bill. | |
Party membership has gone up to 540,000 under his leadership - people are engaged in politics in a way they were not before. He ends with a call for “real social justice right across this country” to slightly more applause. | |
8.35pm BST | |
20:35 | |
Two-minute closing pitches now: | |
Owen Smith says the country is in crisis that was compounded by the Brexit vote. Labour’s legacy is being wiped out and the party is divided. The answer is a powerful, strong opposition that is a government-in-waiting, he tells the Cardiff debate. | |
Smith promises to deliver the most radical programme since the Labour administration of 1945. “I will take us back to government,” he ends on, to strong applause from the audience. | |
8.32pm BST | |
20:32 | |
Final question is about how to re-engage voters in Wales. | |
Corbyn mentions a number of concepts, including the EU funding that could be lost being replaced by Westminster. It’s also unacceptable that travelling from north to south Wales by a method other than cars is very difficult, he adds. | |
Smith starts by saying he wants a Labour government in power to work with the Labour “comrades” in Wales and would invest £10bn in infrastructure. “We need a Labour government at both ends of the M4.” | |
8.28pm BST | |
20:28 | |
Smith says legislation is needed to narrow the gender pay gap and outlaw discrimination: “To do that we need to be in government ... we’ve got to win, Jeremy.” | |
8.23pm BST | |
20:23 | |
Welsh Labour MP Chris Elmore tweets: | |
.@owensmith2016 says #Labour should be ashamed of anti semitism in the party. Jeremy supporter shouts 'why' - I'm shocked beyond words! | |
8.22pm BST | |
20:22 | |
A question – which could be the last – about female leadership of the Labour party. | |
Smith thinks 50% of the party’s MPs and shadow cabinet should be women. | |
Corbyn mentions all-women shortlists and driving down the gender pay gap as ways to promote women. His first shadow cabinet was majority female, he adds. | |
Updated | Updated |
at 8.25pm BST | |
8.19pm BST | |
20:19 | |
Huffington Post political editor Paul Waugh tweets: | |
Shades of Kinnock/Militant speech there from Smith Ashamed that 'The Labour party, the Labour party,..accused of anti-semitism' | |
8.18pm BST | |
20:18 | |
Labour has been too slow to admit that the party has a problem with antisemitism – something it should be ashamed of, Smith says. “How has this happened?” he asks Corbyn. | |
Corbyn says many of the cases pre-date his leadership and wants Labour to be inclusive. Nineteen members have been suspended and rule changes are coming, he adds. | |
Updated | Updated |
at 8.25pm BST | |
8.16pm BST | |
20:16 | |
On to antisemitism, which Corbyn says has “no place in the Labour party”. | |
Smith says he would have “zero tolerance” – with no short-term suspensions. “They would be out.” | |
Corbyn says every case should be investigated: “That’s what we are doing.” | |
Updated | Updated |
at 8.25pm BST | |
8.12pm BST | |
20:12 | |
Smith says we are an immigrant nation, which is something we “need to be proud of”. | |
He refuses to set targets for immigrations because we need migrants. | |
Corbyn says non-European immigration is strictly controlled and that needs to be looked at. He adds that Smith is right about the need for migrant nurses in the NHS, for example. | |
There are 2 million British people in Europe who want to stay there and that should be remembered, the Labour leader notes. | |