JEREMY CORBYN insisted that Labour is an “enormous” tent open to all yesterday after Sadiq Khan called for the party to broaden its appeal.

The newly elected London Mayor warned at the weekend that Labour was “doomed to fail” unless it reached out beyond its core support base on the left.

“Labour has to be a big tent that appeals to everyone, not just its activists,” said Mr Khan in a pointed message to the party leader.

But Mr Corbyn, himself a keen camper, rubbished the suggestion, saying: “We have a big tent — in fact it’s enormous.”

His retort came after he used an address to the sometimes fractious weekly meeting of Labour MPs and peers to urge them to turn their fire on the Tories.

“We need to reflect on the impact of what we do and say here on the public outside, across the country,” he told them.

“I don’t expect, or even want, blind loyalty, but members and supporters expect us all to focus on taking on the Tories — and for our debates to be focused on policy, not personality.

“We need, if not across-the-board unity, then at least respect for each other and to turn our fire turned on this Tory government and its forced academisation, tax and disability cuts policies in utter disarray.”

He accepted that Labour’s election results last week were “mixed” and that the party was “not yet doing enough to win in 2020.”

But Mr Corbyn pointed to the BBC’s national vote share projection that put Labour one point ahead of the Tories as evidence that the polls represented “the first stage in our task of building a winning electoral majority.”

As well as reclaiming the position of London mayor after eight years of Tory rule, Labour also won the Bristol mayoral election for the first time, retained two parliamentary seats in by-elections and avoided a widely predicted slump in council seats.

Mr Corbyn added: “Last week’s elections showed Labour’s recovery has begun in earnest. We now need to work together to turn that into the kind of sustained revival that will deliver an election victory for the whole country in 2020.”