LABOUR is looking at expelling Jeremy Corbyn from the party altogether for accepting a donation from a grassroots campaign.

Mr Corbyn remains a party member, although he has been denied the parliamentary whip since 2020 and banned by leader Sir Keir Starmer from standing again as a Labour candidate.

He has taken a £5,000 donation from We Deserve Better, a campaign launched by left journalist Owen Jones to support independent and green parliamentary candidates.

This potentially places Mr Corbyn in breach of party rules, although Labour has yet to confirm any action against him. 

However, shadow health secretary Wes Streeting, who has himself received huge donations from people involved in the private healthcare sector, said at the weekend that it was “not acceptable” for the former Labour leader to have taken the money.

We Deserve Better accused the party of “rank hypocrisy” and claimed that it had let 30 other Labour candidates take the same kind of donation.

The move to sanction Mr Corbyn was “a desperate and transparently factional attack,” it added.

Mr Jones argued that “Labour is happy to take money from right-wing businessmen who expect, in return, a government which will protect their wealth and power.”

Labour has now started the process of selecting a candidate for Mr Corbyn’s constituency of Islington North, despite the objections of the local party and many others.

It is likely that Mr Corbyn will announce his own independent candidacy before long, which would certainly place himself outside the party, since its rules state that “declaring an intention to stand in a public election in opposition to a party candidate” means automatic exclusion.