John Woodcock’s stupid rebellion against Corbyn is a gift to the Conservatives

Last Updated: March 26, 2016By
John Woodcock, Labour MP for Barrow and Furness and, in the opinion of This Writer, a complete and utter twit [Image: Laura Lean/PA].

John Woodcock, Labour MP for Barrow and Furness and, in the opinion of This Writer, a complete and utter twit [Image: Laura Lean/PA].

The so-called ‘Bitterite’ wing of the Labour Party is so inept it is almost beyond belief. No wonder they lost two general elections.

The problem for the vast majority of the Labour movement is that these idiots, by continuing to cry about the fact that a genuinely popular leader has taken charge of what they considered ‘their’ party, may scupper further opportunities to trounce the Tories.

So we have John Woodcock, MP for Barrow and Furness, who chose the week Jeremy Corbyn’s popularity eclipsed that of David Cameron to tell everybody the Labour leader was bad for the party.

He claimed, on Twitter, that Corbyn is “unwittingly aiding and abetting the Tories” – without even the slightest trace of irony, according to a response by Matthew Black. Of course, Mr Woodcock’s rebellion undermines the recent progress made by Labour and helps the Conservatives.

Is this merely an appalling misjudgement by Mr Woodcock, or is he a Tory fifth-columnist?

An even worse misjudgement was the claim that the disabled are being

“appallingly served by a leadership team who cannot even get its act together properly to stand up for disabled people when they are screwed over by the Tories.”

Perhaps Mr Woodcock has forgotten New Labour’s attitude to the sick and disabled. Let us remind him:

New Labour was the party that introduced Employment and Support Allowance and the hated Work Capability Assessment (WCA) that have caused distress, destitution and death to the disabled.

When members demanded prior to the 2015 general election that Labour (under Ed Miliband) should pledge to end the tyranny of the WCA, they were told that Labour would not support scrapping it because of fears it [would] play badly with the right wing press and damage Labour’s electoral chances”.

So neoliberal Labour – now known as the ‘Bitterites’ – believed it was important that disabled people continue to die in order to improve their chances of appealing to middle-class voters through the right-wing press.

John Woodcock seems to believe that is how Labour should stand up for the disabled.

This Writer prefers Jeremy Corbyn’s way. Call me a sentimentalist if you like, but it seems more humane to try to help them to live.

It is notable that Mr Woodcock’s rallying cry against Jeremy Corbyn has been answered by only two other MPs.

Jamie Reed, who represents Copeland in Cumbria, said

“If your boss is killing your firm, do you stay quiet?”

He seems to have a strange idea of failure. Since Jeremy Corbyn announced his candidacy for the Labour leadership, membership of the party has almost doubled and support for the now-leader is overwhelming.

And Angela Smith, member for Penistone and Stockbridge, claimed Mr Corbyn had

“failed to make any significant statement on the EU and had failed to hit out at the Tories.”

This is hardly surprising as Labour’s EU referendum campaign is being run by Alan Johnson. Mr Corbyn has concentrated on attacking Conservative Government policies – and, as his barnstorming speech on Budget Day showed, he’s been doing very well at it.

Many of us think this is exactly what an Opposition leader should be doing.

Source: Labour MPs back call for Jeremy Corbyn to stand down | Politics | The Guardian

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29 Comments

  1. Joan Edington March 26, 2016 at 1:23 pm - Reply

    I know that many people consider Nicola Sturgeon too controlling of her party but there has to be some happy medium between that and the constant back-stabbing of these Blairites. Corbyn has to take much better control of Labour if they have to stand a chance in 2020. Blair may have had the electable face for middle England after the Thatcher era and his government did do some good things among the war-mongering. However, his acolytes seem to think it is their divine right to run Labour, even if the membership and the public are totally opposed to their policies.

    • Julie brooks March 27, 2016 at 11:31 pm - Reply

      Well she would do they don’t pay for nothing free prescriptions free universities why,,???????

      • Joan Edington March 30, 2016 at 6:51 pm - Reply

        I don’t understand this as a response to my comment, I’m afraid. My comment was regarding Corbyn vs Blairites, the topic of the post. It sounds like you have decided to use it for some totally irrelevant, incomprehensible & grammatically illeterate SNP-bashing.

  2. stephen brophy March 26, 2016 at 1:40 pm - Reply

    He should step down and join the tory party if he doesn’t like what we the people want!

    • Terry Kelly March 28, 2016 at 6:25 pm - Reply

      John Woodcock is subject to the will of his CLP. It is perfectly within the rules and perfectly legal and democratic for those CLP members to remove him and replace him with another candidate. That is what he deserves and if I were a member of his CLP that is what I would be campaigning to persuade the members to do,he is deliberately
      doing as much damage to Labour as he possibly can, there is no excuse for such behaviour, get him out.

  3. Aelfy March 26, 2016 at 1:52 pm - Reply

    Pick up your toys and knuckle down to the fight ahead or go away, to be honest you are a waste of space!

  4. Jane Owens March 26, 2016 at 2:01 pm - Reply

    Gosh, is it stupidity? Is it a lack of insight? Is it a case of ‘hard cheese’? When are Jeremy Corbyn’s naysayers going to wake up and smell the coffee? He is the person we Labour party members voted to lead the party and entrust to defend the party’s principles and we are ready to support him into the next General Election. What part of the ‘majority vote’ are the naysayers failing to grasp?

  5. jeffrey davies March 26, 2016 at 2:28 pm - Reply

    they still dont get it the bb in this party the peasants wants a true labour supporter not a greedie mp jeff3

  6. Wayne Leon March 26, 2016 at 2:38 pm - Reply

    Join the bloody Tories if you don’t like the Labour Party now. What an absolute first class idiot!!!

  7. Ibrahim March 26, 2016 at 3:15 pm - Reply

    It really was a damp squib of a rebellion if you could call it that. A rebellion usually entails a significant number of people.

  8. Samuel Miller (@Hephaestus7) March 26, 2016 at 3:23 pm - Reply

    After the May 2015 general election, interim Labour leader Harriet Harman Harriet Harman ordered Labour MPs not to block the Tory welfare bill despite vocal opposition from three leadership candidates.

    She said Labour should also not oppose certain conditions in the planned cap on household welfare benefits.

    The party simply could not tell the public they were wrong after two general election defeats in a row, she said, adding it had been defeated because it had not been trusted on the economy or benefits.

    • Mike Sivier March 26, 2016 at 6:05 pm - Reply

      Yes, and of course if you look at the facts, Labour’s economic record is far superior to that of the Tories.

  9. paulrutherford8 March 26, 2016 at 3:25 pm - Reply

    It is because Trident subs are made in Woodcock’s constituency and Mr Corbyn quite sensibly talks about scrapping Trident, which after all, is just a weapon to be used in retaliation for a nuclear strike on us. Mutually assured destruction is a very out-dated policy and has no place in the world today.

    What Woodcock fails to realise is that other submarines are available, and where else would they be built?

    The man is an utter pillock. His reaction to tweets about him were of the “I know best” variety.

  10. Mr.Angry March 26, 2016 at 4:29 pm - Reply

    Excellent article to which I whole heartedly agree this “man” obviously has a misconceived view of what we the voting public want.

    If he had any decency he should step down from his post as he is doing nothing to support what the party truly represents.

  11. k March 26, 2016 at 4:57 pm - Reply

    Jeremy Corbyn is not “a genuinely popular leader”.

    How is anything Woodcock said “a gift to the Tories”?

    This is a delusional article.

    • Mike Sivier March 26, 2016 at 5:59 pm - Reply

      From the number of bald, evidenceless statements here, I thought you must be a Tory.
      I’ve written an article stating my case, and the evidence is clear. I don’t see any reason to repeat myself for someone who can’t even form an argument of their own. But just to prevent you from whining, here:
      While people like Woodcock try to divide the PLP, against the wishes of the party as a whole, the Tories are free to capitalise on the apparent disarray – because that is how it will be presented to us. Apparent disarray caused by people like Woodcock, of course.

  12. Lynn Dye March 26, 2016 at 5:28 pm - Reply

    Very well said, Mike, great article and couldn’t agree more on all points.

  13. John March 26, 2016 at 8:11 pm - Reply

    I don’t know if you already have Mike, but it might be an idea to send a direct tweet to John Woodcock with a link to this blog post (if he wants to take any notice that is, or be bothered to read what you have written). I assume that is, that he DOESN’T already know about you and this blog site? Oh, and stop laughing at my suggestion will you, it’s ONLY a suggestion ! :)
    Personally, I’m not sure that Woodcock has the mental capacity to take this post in properly (sorry John!), because I’m still trying to figure out exactly what he hopes to achieve by doing what he’s doing. I reckon it’s about time that Corbyn got tough and gave him an ultimatum personally.
    On a last note, I know that you DO tweet links to these blog posts (because I’ve caught the odd one or two when I’ve been looking at twitter), but I hope you’re regularly and repeatedly posting links on twitter, because (whilst people are always entitled to their own views), this sort of detailed and accurate information needs to be presented on social media as much as possible (of course, I expect that you’ll be doing all of this already).

    • Mike Sivier March 26, 2016 at 9:32 pm - Reply

      I tweeted him with the link at the same time as the post was published and have had nothing back so far.

  14. melody Norris March 26, 2016 at 8:15 pm - Reply

    Having lived on Barrow-in-Furness for 20 years, moved away in January, I can say ,yes, the man (john woodcock) is useless for the Labour Party,and his constituents.he’s a tory in every way bit the. Party he claims to represent.only issue the man os concerned about. Is trident as Barrow town is built around the shipyard,literally !

  15. Phil Lee March 26, 2016 at 10:53 pm - Reply

    Chuck out the fifth columnist by de-selecting him.
    Along with any others that can be identified (they mostly seem to self-identify, so that shouldn’t be hard).

  16. ID Smith March 27, 2016 at 9:31 am - Reply

    Vote Labour for fairness, equality, peace and prosperity. JC4PM. Former Lab leader George Lansbury’s “brutal” removal in the 1930s was motivated by Labour people who saw their future in sharing power with Tories in a national government. Could this be Woodcock’s destructive aim today? Power sharing with Tories. Perish the thought. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Lansbury

  17. Dominic Berry March 27, 2016 at 10:02 am - Reply

    Woodcock is trying to dilute the Labour Party into a semi-New version, where the wannabee Tories can cut the same deals with rich donors for tax cuts and a blind eye from regulation.

    Let Corbyn take a six month holiday. Let’s see what Woodcock can achieve in his absence. The Labour Party would disappear down the toilet.

    Then let Corbyn return. Support will go through the roof. Woodcock will know to keep his mouth shut by then.

    He shouldn’t be holding the unity of the Labour Party to ransom.
    The days of New Labour are over. We tried it. It’s useless.

    • Mike Sivier March 27, 2016 at 11:33 am - Reply

      I don’t think Corbyn taking a six-month holiday would be a good idea at all. Imagine the fun the Tories and their cronies in the media would have.
      They would harden opinions against him so that, when he returned, he wouldn’t have the support he has now.

  18. Alan Grant March 27, 2016 at 10:26 am - Reply

    I don’t know if it’s just the tie, but he looks like a Tory to me.

    • Aelfy March 27, 2016 at 4:50 pm - Reply

      Could it be because he has the same flat faced inbred look of the tory (ahem) elite?

      • Mike Sivier March 29, 2016 at 8:44 pm - Reply

        Let’s discuss the issues, rather than insult people.

  19. Aelfy March 30, 2016 at 12:51 am - Reply

    Sorry Mike, I let my anger control my tongue x

    • Mike Sivier March 30, 2016 at 1:02 am - Reply

      That’s okay. I don’t want to provide people with ammunition, if you see what I mean.

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