LABOUR’S internal war intensified today as former leader Jeremy Corbyn tied the party’s unprecedented decision to ban him from standing again to a broader assault on democratic rights.

At the same time his successor Sir Keir Starmer insisted on LBC radio that he had never supported or been friends with Mr Corbyn, whom he described as a “friend” when running for the leadership.

The Islington North MP, who was banned two weeks ago from being a Labour candidate in Islington North at the next election by the national executive committee (NEC), penned a piece in the Islington Tribune condemning the “insult to the millions of people who voted for our party in 2017 and 2019” as well as to those who supported Sir Keir’s leadership bid on the basis he would, as he claimed, maintain Mr Corbyn’s radical policies.