Readers of this blog, and especially prospective students in PPE and History and Politics, should see this on-going exchange between my colleague Bruno Leipold, a diehard Corbynista (and expert on Marx), and myself, a defender of what he calls ‘the embittered sliver’ of the Labour Party who want rid of him, as a showcase of the good natured and humoured discourse that goes on here at the university. [You can read my piece here, and his response here.] From time to time we like to talk about so-called ‘real politics’, and why ideas matter. Now, in his article, he describes the only alternative to Corbyn as a ‘coterie of SPADs, PR advisors and Oxford PPE graduates that got Labour into this mess’. But …

There was always a chance Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the British Labour Party would come to this. At the time of writing, despite an overwhelming vote of no confidence among Labour MPs, he clings on, citing a democratic mandate of party members. Each side points to the Brexit vote as its reason for acting (or not). An irrefutable moment of crisis underscores the urgency in trying to either maintain party unity, the risible Corbyn position, or for selecting an electable leader, the PLP position. Others in the Corbyn camp, I suspect, see this as a moment to finally rid the party of recalcitrant Blairites (their real opponents are always the so-called Blairites). It seems no one is prepared to let this crisis go …