Jeremy Corbyn is hanging Tony Blair out to dry after Labour leader refuses to whip his MPs to vote against motion investigating ex-PM over role in Iraq war
The hapless leftie is not even attending today’s debate by the SNP - and is not forcing his MPs to either
JEREMY Corbyn is hanging Tony Blair out to dry over a potential new investigation into the former Prime Minister’s role in the Iraq War.
The Labour leader is refusing to whip his MPs to vote against a motion by the SNP which would trigger a Parliamentary inquiry into whether his predecessor misled the House of Commons in the run-up to the conflict.
The veteran leftie is a former leader of the Stop the War Coalition, and was massively against the intervention in Iraq to topple Saddam Hussein.
He is not attending today's debate on the Scots nationalists motion, and by imposing just a so-called ‘one-line whip’ his fellow Labour MPs don’t have to either.
It means they could even back the former Scottish first minister Alex Salmond's bid to question Mr Blair again without fear of sanction.
Mr Salmond has drawn cross-party support for his motion calling on the Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee to probe any differences between Mr Blair's public statements in the lead-up to the invasion, and private correspondence with then US president George Bush revealed by the Chilcot inquiry.
How to respond to the motion was reported to have caused ructions at the weekly meeting of Labour MPs, with some demanding a stringent three-line whip be imposed to emphasise the party's opposition.
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A source close to the Labour leadership said that Mr Corbyn expected MPs to oppose the motion, but is refusing to make the vote a ‘three-line whip’, which would force them to do so.
Mr Salmond has accused the ex-PM of presenting misleading information to Parliament, and the motion notes the "contrast between private correspondence to the United States government and public statements to Parliament and people and also in the presentation of intelligence information".
The SNP points to a note Mr Blair wrote to the US president in 2002 stating: "I'll be with you, whatever," as proof that he misled MPs about his intentions.
The motion calls on the parliamentary committee to "conduct a further specific examination of this contrast in public and private policy and of the presentation of intelligence".
The motion is backed by the Greens, Plaid Cymru, Tory MP Sir David Amess, and Labour's Kate Hoey.