Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Clause IV or not, Jeremy Corbyn wants to change Labour

Jeremy Corbyn’s supporters and spokespeople are fiercely debating whether or not he told the Independent on Sunday’s Jane Merrick that he wants to bring back clause IV. His quote to the journalist seems pretty clear:

‘I think we should talk about what the objectives of the party are, whether that’s restoring Clause Four as it was originally written or it’s a different one. But we shouldn’t shy away from public participation, public investment in industry and public control of the railways.

‘I’m interested in the idea that we have a more inclusive, clearer set of objectives. I would want us to have a set of objectives which does include public ownership of some necessary things such as rail.’

So Corbyn wants a restoration of Labour’s focus on public ownership, whether or not it means bringing back a clause in the party’s constitution that reads as badly as this:

‘To secure for the workers by hand or by brain the full fruits of their industry and the most equitable distribution thereof that may be possible upon the basis of the common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange, and the best obtainable system of popular administration and control of each industry or service.’

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