I backed the SDP. But this Labour schism makes no sense at all | Polly Toynbee

During a national crisis over Brexit, the breakaway of seven MPs with no policy programme is a dangerous distraction

The great Brexit crisis slices through both parties, dividing families, friends, neighbours and colleagues. It may yet break apart the moribund political system. But that seismic rupture didn’t happen today when seven MPs walked out of the Labour party.

Seven is a pitifully small number. The timing is monstrously badly judged and the reasons the MPs give are oddly scattergun, lacking political punch and focus. To be sure, they are not alone in thinking Jeremy Corbyn a weak leader with many failings: his poll ratings show most of the country agrees, as did the 172 Labour MPs who voted no confidence in him two and half years ago, as his “kinder gentler politics” turned poisonous.

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from The Guardian http://bit.ly/2BGVvEl