Scottish leader says she could not do her job if 80 per cent of colleagues had lost confidence
Jeremy Corbyn is ‘not competent’ as Leader of the Labour Party, according to the party’s leader in Scotland.
In her first major appearance, since Labour’s civil war erupted, Kezia Dugdale addressed criticisms from party members in Scotland who are supporting Corbyn to continue as leader.
Speaking about the importance of a leader having the support of their parliamentary colleagues she explained:
“I respect and really appreciate the mandate and the trust that many people in this room placed in me.
“If I then had to go into the Parliament and work with colleagues, 80 per cent of which did not want me to be there, I would find my job incredibly difficult if not impossible.”
Asked in a press briefing afterwards Corbyn was competent to be leader, she said, ‘if he’s lost the faith of 80 per cent of his colleagues then he can’t do his job, he’s therefore not competent to do his job.’
Dugdale’s comments will only further exacerbate splits within the Scottish Party over the issue of the UK wide leadership, with her Deputy, Alex Rowley, calling for Labour MPs to stand united behind Jeremy Corbyn in the face of a divided Conservative party.
Dugdale further used her contribution at an event focused on addressing the concerns of those Scots who voted to leave the EU argued that the remain campaign ‘neither attempted to vigorously defend immigration or really come up with the solutions that would have satisfied people.’
She went on to echo comments made previously by Ruth Davidson, Leader of the Scottish Conservative Party, by arguing that it would be ‘categorically wrong’ to refuse a second independence referendum ‘if there was a compelling sense that the Scottish people wanted a second referendum’.
Dugdale has already been criticised for her comments by Labour activists loyal to Corbyn.
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5 Responses to “Dugdale says Corbyn is ‘not competent’ to lead Labour”
Karen Dean
Just putting it out there, what about her competence to lead? How is Scottish Labour doing?
Paul watson
She should perhaps desist until she convinces s he can do her own job or is she saying labour cannot afford incompetent people leading in both England and Scotland ?
Richard MacKinnon
Karen,
The answer to your first question is not good. At the recent Scottish elections with KZ at the wheel Labour slipped to third place at Holyrood behind the Tories. The answer to your second question is badly. They have only one MP left in Scotland and he has recently resigned from shadow front bench, therefore Labour has no Scottish MP that can speak for Scotland at shadow cabinet meetings.
Any empathy Kezia Dugdale had within the Scottish political scene has long gone. She is fast becoming a comic figure. Labour in Scotland have been watching the constitutional express train from the other side of the fence for years. They were swept away at GE May 2015 because they took sides with the Tories in 2014. In 2014 most of their core support voted for independence against the Labour Party line and Labour never even saw that one coming, so out of touch are they with that core support. May 2016 saw the Tories as official opposition to the SNP. But it is May 2017 that will see Labour in Scotland properly sunk. Their last remaining councils in Lanarkshire and Glasgow stink of corruption. This will see the end of Labour in Scotland. I cannot see them ever recover.
So getting back to KZ. From the outside looking in she is seen in Scotland as a decent young woman who has only been around for 5 minutes and who is way out her depth trying to do an impossible job. Her intervention in the Corbyn debacle is one of those farcical moments that cannot be retold. ‘You would have to be there to really appreciate it’.
So my message is ‘keep it up Kez’. “I cannot tell you how much pleasure you are giving this old man”.
Eddie Clarke
Typical social media responses to serious, not to say blindingly obvious, remarks. Shows we are in a very bad place, with no obvious way out.
Mark Livingston
Join Labour. Let’s get rid of these wretched Tory-lites once and for all!