JEREMY Corbyn has been rated “10 out of 10” as Labour leader by Rebecca Long Bailey, who has become the sixth candidate in the contest to succeed him.
The Shadow Business Secretary accepted Labour had not been not trusted on Brexit, tackling anti-Semitism or its policy platform as she acknowledged the failings that led to the party's disastrous General Election result.
But she praised Mr Corbyn's leadership and character as she gave him a perfect score - despite Labour crashing to its second election defeat under his tenure.
"I thought Corbyn was one of the most honest, kind, principled politicians I've ever met," she declared.
Ms Long Bailey, 40, told ITV News: "I'd give him 10 out of 10 because I respect him and I supported him all the way through.
"What we can't ignore was that Jeremy was savaged from day one by the press...We have a role as a party to develop the image of our leader and to put them forward in the most positive way but we also have a duty to rebut criticism and attacks.
"As a party we needed to have a rebuttal unit, a clear structure in place to rebut the attacks against him," explained the Salford MP.
Last night, the six leadership candidates, who also include Keir Starmer, Emily Thornberry, Lisa Nandy, Jess Philips and Clive Lewis.
Earlier, she set out the problems which saw the party lose 59 seats at the general election.
"We weren't trusted on Brexit. We weren't trusted as a party to tackle the crisis of anti-Semitism. We weren't trusted on our policies; no matter how radical or detailed they were. They simply didn't hit the ground running," insisted Ms Long Bailey.
In a break from Mr Corbyn, she signalled she would be prepared to press the nuclear button if she became Prime Minister.
"If you have a deterrent you have to be prepared to use it," she said but stressed she was "not going to be a warmonger".
She won support from Ian Lavery, the party Chairman, who announced he would not contest the leadership, and John McDonnell, the Shadow Chancellor.
Meanwhile, Ian Murray, Labour’s only Scottish MP, announced he was standing for the deputy leadership role and left the door open to a debate around splitting Scottish Labour off from the UK party.
Asked about calls for Scottish Labour to split from the UK party, the Edinburgh South MP told ITV Representing Border: “I don’t think we should have any knee-jerk reactions to what happened on December 12.
“We are all feeling incredibly sore and, yes, there will be people that will want to look at that as an option. And maybe we should look at that as an option; leave everything on the table.
“But the important thing is here not to look internally but to look externally. And I’ve always been a principled politician. I’ve always said that I’ll be honest with people.
“And the honest thing is that the public were telling us the problems with the Labour Party; both at UK level and in Scotland,” added Mr Murray, who is due to launch his bid to succeed Tom Watson formally in Edinburgh next week.
Elsewhere, Ms Phillips, who represents Birmingham Yardley, came out firmly against a second Scottish independence referendum, telling the BBC’s Good Morning Scotland: “I cannot see a circumstance where I would think that it would be better for Scotland to leave the United Kingdom. I cannot see where that would ever be the case.”
On Wednesday, Tony Lloyd, the MP for Rochdale, will experience his first Scottish Questions at the Commons dispatch box as Labour's new Shadow Scottish Secretary.
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