Ex-Labour MP Zarah Sultana has revealed she wants the new left-wing party she’s founding with Jeremy Corbyn to merely be called ‘The Left’.
The Coventry South MP quit Labour earlier this month in order to launch her new outfit with Mr Corbyn, the former Labour leader.
Ms Sultana and Mr Corbyn’s movement has the website yourparty.uk, with a welcome message saying ‘this is your party’.
But Ms Sultana sowed confusion immediately after its launch by insisting a name had not yet been chosen. She frantically posted on social media: ‘It’s not called Your Party.’
It was explained that members would decide on the new party’s name at a later date, but political opponents mocked the ‘chaotic’ launch.
It followed claims Ms Sultana had previously caught Mr Corbyn by surprise by quitting Labour and publicly announcing their plans to found a new party.
Mr Corbyn last week insisted the launch of the new party was ‘not messy at all’ and ‘a totally coherent approach’.
In an interview with left-wing website Novara Media, Ms Sultana revealed her own thoughts on what the new outfit should be called.
‘This obviously will be chosen by the members in the most democratic way possible,’ Ms Sultana said.
‘Everyone has got an opinion, I do too. I think it should be called “The Left” or “The Left Party”, because it says what it is on the tin. That is something I will be pitching.’
Ms Sultana had the Labour whip suspended last year for voting against the Government over the two-child limit on benefits.
She has also been a frequent critic of Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer’s stance on the Gaza crisis.
Ms Sultana branded her former party a ‘genocide party’ and an ‘austerity party’ as she hailed how more than 500,000 people had now signed up to her new venture.
‘I am very excited to be part of building something new. It has never been done before in British politics,’ she added.
‘Being able to take half a million people and more… on this journey to shape something truly transformative is so important, exciting and I recognise it as one of the most important opportunities of a lifetime.’
Ms Sultana warned ‘we can’t get this wrong’ as she outlined how opinion polls suggest Reform UK could win the next general election.
‘We can’t get this wrong because in 2029, as the polling currently stands, [Nigel] Farage will be prime minister,’ she said.
‘Someone like me, someone who looks like me, understands that threat acutely. And so we have to not just organise and build a new party, we have to win.’
Quizzed about the accusations of ‘chaos’ that accompanied the launch of her new party with Mr Corbyn, Ms Sultana insisted that ‘we do know what we’re doing’.
‘Westminster journalists love this idea of drama, they love this idea of the Left not really knowing we’re doing,’ she said.
‘But we do know what we’re doing and half a million also recognise that. And the truth is they’re rattled, they’ve never seen anything like this.
‘The fact that we’re trying to really have democracy, not just this slogan or you just kind of say it and don’t mean it, we’re trying to have it at the heart of everything we’re doing.
‘And the idea that members choose the name, people can’t get their heads around it. That’s democracy for you.’