Keir Starmer and Jeremy Corbyn

Jeremy Corbyn seemed to fade from the public conscience after he led Labour into its catastrophic electoral defeat in 2019.

Keir Starmer, with a reputation for being “sensible”, was elected in his place as Labour leader – and he soon acted on his promise to pull the party towards the centre again by promptly ousting Corbyn in an antisemitism row.

The left-wing figure, who galvanised a whole generation of new Labour voters during his four years at the helm of the party, was suddenly relegated to the backbenches while most of his followers drifted away, disappointed they missed out on the chance to implement real change at the final hurdle.

Starmer’s landslide victory in July 2024 then seemed to cement the theory that a more pragmatic, centrist take on politics worked (even if voters actually flocked to Labour out of frustration with the Tories).

Fast-forward a year, and voters are once again embittered, furious with the government and desperate for change, while right-wing Reform UK are easily beating Labour in the polls.

Enter, stage left: Corbyn.

Having been elected as an independent MP for Islington North, Corbyn is now a comfortable distance from the dissatisfying Labour government, his disappointing performance in the 2019 election forgotten.

When he announced last week that he was launching a new political group – with the confusing placeholder name,yourparty.uk – more than 600,000 people signed up within days.

That’s larger than the Labour membership was at its height, during the Corbyn days.

Of course, those are just sign-ups not paid-up members – and so his announcement was initially written off by those within Labour.

With an exasperated eye roll, some government sources just shook their heads, and called him a........

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