Labour leadership: Emily Thornberry gives Corbyn ‘0 out of 10’ for electoral performance

Labour leadership candidate Emily Thornberry has ranked Jeremy Corbyn “10 out of 10” for principle, but gave him a zero rating for his electoral record and just two for tackling allegations of antisemitism.

The shadow foreign secretary provided her numerical assessment of Mr Corbyn’s four-year tenure as Labour leader after one of her rivals in the contest, Rebecca Long-Bailey, gave him a “10 out of 10” score.

As those vying to succeed Mr Corbyn battle to secure the backing of a sufficient number of MPs in order to reach the next stage of the contest, Ms Thornberry appeared to distance herself from the current leadership with a less generous ranking.

The shadow cabinet minister, who has served in various roles in Mr Corbyn’s top team since 2015, said the party needed to “get on our hands and knees to ask forgiveness” from the Jewish community.

Speaking to Sky News on Thursday, Ms Thornberry said she was “convinced that Jeremy is not antisemitic”, but added: “I think that clearly we completely failed when it came to dealing with antisemitism in the party and that was a failure of leadership and Jeremy knows my views on this.

“I’m afraid I would not give him more than two out of 10 in relation to that.”

The shadow cabinet minister continued: “But when it comes to principle, bringing people into the party, firing up the party, bringing us back to speaking from our hearts, I’d give him 10 out 10.

“Losing an election is probably the most important thing by which you would measure a leader and obviously we lost very, very badly. On that basis I would give him on that nought out of 10 – what else could I do?”

It remains uncertain whether Ms Thornberry will pass through to the second round of the leadership contest, having secured just three out of the 22 nominations required from MPs and MEPs before Monday afternoon.

Speaking earlier on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, however, she remained hopeful about her prospects: “Well, we’ve got a few more days to go. I have a number of people who have pledged to support me. I am out there making the argument. Let’s see what happens.”

Ms Long-Bailey, who is seen as the left’s favoured contender for the leadership, has denied that she is the “continuity Corbyn” candidate in the race, but earlier this week said she would give the Labour leader “10 out of 10” for his record.

She told ITV: “I thought Corbyn was one of most honest, kind, principled politicians I’ve ever met.”

And, pressed to give him a mark out of 10, she replied: “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.”

In a surprise move, Barry Gardiner, the shadow international trade secretary, said he was considering a late entry into the contest and that he would make a final decision before the end of Thursday.