Owen Smith to launch Labour leadership bid with plan for £200bn 'new deal'

Robin de Peyer18 July 2016
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Owen Smith will today launch his Labour leadership bid with plans for a £200 billion "British new deal".

Attacking Jeremy Corbyn for being anti-austerity without bringing forward an alternative, Mr Smith will pledge to invest the money into the country's "failing" infrastructure.

At a rescheduled speech in his Pontypridd constituency, Mr Smith is to commit cash to housing, transport and "investing in people".

The former work and pensions secretary postponed his leadership launch in the wake of the terror attacks in Nice, France.

It will go ahead on Sunday and he will say: "It is not enough for the The Labour Party to simply talk about being anti-austerity. We have to set out a detailed plan for how Labour would replace failed Tory austerity with credible proposals for prosperity.

Labour hopeful: Welsh MP Owen Smith
PA

"That is why I'm proposing a British new deal. It will be a £200bn investment programme, to renew our failing infrastructure. Tackling our housing crisis, revive our transport systems, as well as investing in people, to give hope to the next generation."

Mr Smith's leadership launch will come after Mr Corbyn felt moved to tell his supporters not to abuse his challengers for the leadership amid rising intensity in Labour's civil war.

The Labour leader posted a code of conduct for the leadership election on his campaign website after challenger Angela Eagle warned that Labour risks becoming the "new nasty party".

Mr Corbyn called for the contest to be a debate about the party and the country and said he wanted it to be an example of "vibrant political discussion".

In the code of conduct, he went on: "As a candidate I will treat all with respect, behave with civility and expect all who support me to do the same.

"All Labour Party members and supporters should conduct themselves with a high standard of behaviour. This debate is about politics, not personalities, and no personal abuse of any nature will not be accepted.

Ms Eagle had called for action from the leadership on "abuse, misogyny, homophobia (and) anti-Semitism" affecting the party.

Her call came shortly after Labour's National Executive Committee suspended all local party meetings amid reports of intimidation, bullying and threatening behaviour, and just days after a brick was thrown through her own constituency office window in Wallasey on Merseyside.

The party has suspended its constituency party in Brighton and Hove and annulled the results of a recent election following accusations of abusive behaviour, an improper ballot and entryism by far-left activists.

Turning Mr Corbyn's "kinder politics" catchphrase against him, Ms Eagle said that Labour needed "a kinder politics in reality" and must not end up "in the gutter".

In an interview with the Sunday Mirror, Mr Corbyn hinted there may be a legal challenge to the recent decision on who can vote in the leadership election.

Noting that members who joined after January 12 have been barred from voting unless they pay a £25 charge, he said: "There may be a legal move but nothing has been decided yet. Not by me anyway.

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