Labour restored the party whip to four MPs yesterday afternoon who were suspended for rebelling over the two-child benefit cap.
The parliamentarians in question — Richard Burgon, Ian Byrne, Imran Hussain, and Rebecca Long-Bailey — are now back in the party after a six-month sojourn in the Westminster wilderness.
Those four MPs, alongside Apsana Begum, John McDonnell and Zarah Sultana, lost the whip last July for voting for an SNP amendment to the king’s speech that called for the two-child benefit cap to be scrapped.
McDonnell, Begum and Sultana, however, remain suspended.
The approach reflects a “divide and rule” strategy on behalf of the Labour leadership and government whips’ office, with the latter left-wingers singled out for their records since July. McDonnell, Begum and Sultana have remained heavily critical of the government since voting alongside the SNP.
Sultana in particular has been a vocal opponent of the government’s position on Gaza, accusing it of having “actively facilitated genocide” in the territory last month. The independent MP for Coventry South revealed yesterday that she found out about the news of her colleagues’ readmission via a Daily Mirror report. “Turns out speaking up for Palestine is still a punishable offence”, she said.
Sultana also voted for a Conservative motion opposing the winter fuel payments cut in September, alongside Begum and McDonnell — as well as Ian Byrne and Richard Burgon. Imran Hussain and Rebecca Long-Bailey were absent for the vote, commons records show.
Writing on X yesterday, McDonnell said he was pleased four of his colleagues had been readmitted but disappointed Sultana and Begum had not. The former shadow chancellor added that he was “relaxed about my own position as I’ve made clear I don’t expect whip back until we know whether police are to charge me following recent Palestinian demo after which I was interviewed under caution”.
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McDonnell and old ally Jeremy Corbyn, now a member of the “Independent Alliance” of five pro-Gaza MPs, were both interviewed under caution by the Metropolitan Police after a Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) protest in central London. The force is investigating what it sees as a coordinated effort by organisers to breach conditions imposed on the event.
In recent months, McDonnell has continued to use his Westminster clout as a former senior frontbencher to critique the government’s economic policy, and accused the prime minister of speaking in the “language” of austerity last September. But McDonnell, an MP since 1997, is still set on one day returning to the Labour fold, having told LBC in January: “We’ve served our sentence so I’m hoping we’ll simply have the whip restored.”
At the same time, he also warned against the creation of a new party in an article for the Guardian. He wrote: “Even if a leftwing challenger party only took a limited number of votes, this could still cost Labour dearly.”
This episode is part of an ongoing battle between the Labour leadership and the party’s left flank. Diane Abbott, the veteran MP, claimed her lengthy suspension in the last parliament was a “factional manoeuvre”. She was later readmitted and allowed to stand as the Labour candidate for Hackney North and Stoke Newington.
On current form, matters would have to change drastically for Sultana to gain readmission to the parliamentary Labour Party and stand as a candidate at the next election. The latest manoeuvre by the whips’ office could serve to push the rebels, and perhaps her in particular, closer to Corbyn’s Independent Alliance.
For some on the Labour right, an official liaison between independent ex-Labour MPs and Corbyn’s caucus would be a sign of total factional victory.
But for the time being, McDonnell, Begum and Sultana’s example provides an enduring warning to other Labour representatives about the consequences of rebellion. And it comes at a moment when MPs will be considering how or whether to pressure the government over a range of flashpoint issues — not least of all Starmer’s relationship with US president Donald Trump.
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‘We would oppose any effort to move Palestinians in Gaza to neighbouring Arab states against their will. There must be no forced displacement of Palestinians, nor any reduction in territory of the Gaza Strip.’
— Foreign Office minister Anneliese Dodds tells the House of Commons the UK government “would oppose” Donald Trump’s proposal to force Palestinians out of Gaza.
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