McCluskey: we need to win back our party

"Can the unions move Labour left? Yes we can. We have to," he told a Labour Representation Committee TUC fringe meeting last night.

"What's the point of Unite ploughing all this money into the Labour party if 10 years from now we are still the worst protected workers in the whole of the EU?

"If we fail to move Labour left and they win the next election are we going to accept another five years of banging our heads against a wall? If this happens we will have to ask ourselves if Labour is the right party for us.

"We need to wrest our party out of the hands of new Labour. It's endemic and deep rooted in the party and we've got to work hard to create a common narrative to take it back.

"The party has no god-given right. Let's create a radical alternative for the future because there are too many careerists in the Labour Party."

Author Owen Jones said "our biggest enemy is resignation" but added it's impossible to oppose what's happening because there's no clear alternative presented in the mainstream press.

He said there needed to be more Labour MPs from working-class backgrounds.

LRC chairman and Labour MP John McDonnell called for a campaign of collective resistance because every attempt to fight for an alternative left of Labour has failed.