The New Statesman, which presents itself as a left-wing newspaper, has called Jeremy Corbyn ‘unfit to be prime minister’ and is refusing to endorse the Labour Party in the forthcoming election.
It has ruled out backing the current party leader for premier as it did in 2017.
“His reluctance to apologise for the anti-Semitism in Labour and to take a stance on Brexit, the biggest issue facing the country, make him unfit to be prime minister,” said the magazine.
The political theorist and Harvard professor of History Katrina forrester said: “Shame on the New Statesman for this”.
It is the first time the New Statesman has explicitly declined to back a Labour administration in the run-up to a general election since the title’s inception in 1913, the PA reports.
The paper is instead hoping for a hung parliament in this election, urging its readers to vote tactically on a constituency-by-constituency basis.
The New Statesman praised Labour’s membership revival under Corbyn’s leadership and its “bold manifesto” but says “essential judgment” on who leads the country “must be made on Mr Corbyn himself”.
The magazine was pro-Tony Blair and endorsed ex-leader Ed Miliband for prime minister in 2015.
Despite declining to back replacing Boris Johnson with an administration led by Corbyn, the New Statesman said: “It would be a travesty if, after a decade of destructive austerity, the Conservatives were rewarded with another majority.”
Discussing the other parties available, the editorial writers deemed the Liberal Democrat policy of revoking Brexit if it secured a majority at the election “illiberal and undemocratic”.
While the publication stated it would “welcome more Green MPs” in an age dominated by the threat of climate change, it did not go the whole hog of endorsing the Green Party.
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