John McTernan

John McTernan
Born	1959
Alma mater	University of Edinburgh
Leader's Chief of Staff In office 2014 - 2015 Employer Scottish Labour Party  Director of Communications In office September 2011 - June 2013 Employer Australian Prime Minister  Special Adviser  In office 1997 - 2010 Employer UK Labour Party

John McTernan (born 1959) is a former Special Adviser to the Labour Party, political strategist and commentator.

Career

McTernan was Tony Blair's Director of Political Operations from 2005 to 2007. He then worked on the November 2007 Australian Labour Party federal election campaign. From 2007 to 2010 he was Special Adviser to two Cabinet Ministers in Gordon Brown's Labour Government: first to Des Browne, Secretary of State for Scotland and Secretary of State for Defence, and then to Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy MP from 2008 until May 2010.

From June 2010 to October 2011 he was a columnist at The Scotsman, and then Director of Communications for the Australian Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, from September 2011 to June 2013.

He was Chief of Staff to the 2014–2015 leader of the Scottish Labour Party, Jim Murphy, who resigned after the Labour Party lost all but one seat in Scotland, including Murphy's, in the 2015 General Election. Stand-up comedian Mark Steel couldn't resist commenting in August 2016:

"Then there’s John McTernan, the former adviser to Jim Murphy, who insists that Corbyn will be a catastrophe, and that the party should continue with the strategy he devised in Scotland, which took the party’s MPs from 41 to a much more manageable one, making it far easier to deal with admin."

Anti-Corbyn

John McTernan strongly opposed Jeremy Corbyn during the 2015 Labour Party leadership election, describing Corbyn's popularity as a "strange psychological emotional spasm". He asserted:

"I can’t see any case for letting him have two minutes in office, let alone two years in office because I think the damage that will be done to the Labour party in that period makes it incredibly hard to recover."

In a podcast discussion with the Spectator's Isabel Hardman and Sebastian Payne, McTernan nailed his colours to the Blairite mast by declaring:

"Who cares about the grassroots?"

Use the rule book

One month after Corbyn's election with an overwhelming mandate, McTernan described how he could easily be removed as Leader of the Labour Party by following the rule book, which states:

"When the Parliamentary Labour Party is in opposition in the House of Commons, the election of the leader and the deputy leader shall take place at each annual session of Party conference."

Next year’s Labour conference needs to have an election with only one candidate. Not one apart from Corbyn, but only one. The PLP can do that because they control nomination rights. Their task is to ensure that when the annual leadership is held then Corbyn doesn’t meet the threshold. We know his support wasn’t sufficient to get him on the ballot first time round, next time the PLP have to show iron discipline and stand aside to properly keep him out.

There doesn’t need to be a coup, just a cause: the rescuing of the Labour Party on behalf of its voters. A candidate – the one who tests best with middle Britain and the courage to make a choice and stick to it. That will be hard, but this has to end.

In the words of Neil Kinnock: "It can be done, it must be done."

McTernan confounded

On 12 July 2016, Labour's National Executive Committee met and decided that Jeremy Corbyn, the incumbent leader, did not need any PLP nominations to stand in the 2016 leadership election. However, on 26 July 2016 Labour donor and former prospective parliamentary candidate Michael Foster brought a legal action challenging the NEC's decision of 12 July 2016 that the incumbent leader is automatically included in the contest. But in a three-page Judgment on 28 July 2016, Mr Justice Foskett concluded that the decision of the NEC was correct and that Corbyn was entitled to be a candidate in the forthcoming election without the need for nominations. Jeremy Corbyn said:

"I welcome the decision by the High Court to respect the democracy of the Labour party. This has been a waste of time and resources when our party should be focused on holding the government to account."

Entryism

John McTernan told Channel 4 News on 9 August 2016 that, like deputy leader Tom Watson, he believed there is an organised Trotskyist infiltration of the Labour party using a vanguardist approach to grab the leadership and drive it in a particular direction. He said Labour had made a foolish error when it created the category of supporters who could vote in the leadership election but were not subject to its membership rules and thus be expelled from the party. It had taken a long time in the 1980s to get rid of Militant Tendency and Socialist Organiser:

"If Jeremy Corbyn comes back as leader, it can't be as before which allowed John McDonnell to undermine colleagues. Power to choose the Shadow Cabinet must be restored to the PLP."

Vote for oblivion

On 19 August 2016, in another vitriolic piece in the Telegraph newspaper, McTernan concluded:

"There is only one candidate for Labour Leader who can be trusted with the country’s defence. It is increasingly clear that a vote for Corbyn is a vote for oblivion."

The same Telegraph article conducted a poll which revealed that, of 15,406 readers, 57% disagreed with McTernan.

 

Related Documents

Title	Type	Publication date	Author(s)	Description
Document:Margaret Hodge reflects on Jeremy Corbyn	interview	16 August 2016	Peter Hennessy	I know John McDonnell and Ken Livingstone. And I've known Jeremy Corbyn for 35 years when he first became the MP for Islington North and I was leader of Islington Council in local government. I know what they're about: they want the party to be a movement.
Document:That Leaked Labour Party Report	blog post	20 April 2020	Craig Murray	That Leaked Labour Party Report proves conclusively that Sam Matthews’ allegations of unwarranted interference from Corbyn’s office to block anti-semitism action are malicious lies.

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