Watch: Angry Jeremy Corbyn takes on Margaret Thatcher over homelessness in London in 1990
Video gives us a taste of things to come if Jeremy Corbyn is crowned Labour leader next month and takes on David Cameron weekly at PMQs
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Your support makes all the difference.A video has emerged of an angry Jeremy Corbyn taking on Margaret Thatcher at Prime Minister's Questions in the 1990s.
It gives us a taste of things to come if the radical left-winger wins the Labour leadership contest next month and is given six questions to grill David Cameron on a weekly basis.
Mr Corbyn, who was first elected as MP for Islington North in 1983, tore into the then Tory Prime Minister in 1990 for presiding over an increase in homelessness in London. It is believed to be the first time Mr Corbyn was captured on TV.
Speaking through a much wilder beard than the one he boasts now, he is seen shouting at Mrs Thatcher about the tenfold increase in the number of people living without permanent accommodation in London under her watch and accused of her of only providing one sixth of the funding required to tackle homelessness in the capital.
Mr Corbyn said it was "a disgrace to a civilised country" that children were being brought up in Bed and Breakfast accommodation and that 2,000 were sleeping on the streets, while attacking Mrs Thatcher for the "exorbitant rents" being charged on tenants, an attack he is likely to use against Mr Cameron if elected leader on September 12.
Mr Corbyn said: "Will the Prime Minister accept that ten years ago in 1979 there were 2750 households in temporary accommodation in London? The current figure is over 25,000 and a further 2,000 people are sleeping on the streets.
"And that when her government asked the local authorities what resources they required to deal with the homeless problem in London they asked for at least £480m? They were given less than one sixth of what they wanted.
"Does she agree that people sleeping on the streets of our capital city, being charged exorbitant rents and children being brought up in bed and breakfast hotels is a disgrace to a civilised country?"
Mrs Thatcher insisted she had approved "very considerable extra expenditure to relieve homelessness" in London and blamed the backlog of empty council house properties that were taking too long to fill. These were the same properties that ended up being sold under the Conservative party's Right to Buy legislation.
She said: "Mr Speaker, I announced very considerable extra expenditure to relieve homelessness. The honourable member will also be aware there are considerable numbers of empty council properties, which if they were brought into use much more quickly could reduce the number of homelessness.
"For example in Islington [part of Mr Corbyn's constituency], there are 1,162 empty properties. If these were brought round much more quickly these would make a great contribution to relieving the homelessness."
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