Labour MPs fry Corbyn over McDonald’s ban

Although the weekly meeting of the parliamentary Labour party is a private affair, Jeremy Corbyn’s spokesman offers journalists lurking in the committee corridor outside a briefing as soon as it has concluded. Today he had to take questions from hacks on whether or not his boss goes to McDonald’s – prompted by the news that the Labour party is banning the fast food outlet from having a stall at its party conference.

Both the staff and the burger ban came up at the meeting. It started with an observation from Baroness Armstrong that the Labour leader now has a phalanx of staff with him when he attends these sessions, as opposed to just one or two advisers. Corbyn was confronted by Toby Perkins and Wes Streeting about the decision, with Perkins raising the case of a constituent who is being made redundant by the party, and asking why, if Labour is so short of money that it is laying people off, it is turning down £30,000 from McDonald’s? He then asked what sort of a message this move sent.