Tory MP tries to sign up to vote in Labour’s leadership election, gets booted out

Tory MP Tim Loughton appears to have fallen foul of the Labour Party’s new election rules. The party press office’s Twitter account revealed this afternoon that Loughton had attempted to sign up as a ‘Labour supporter’, and pay £3 to vote in the current leadership contest.

He was, however, swiftly rejected – but the party gets to keep his three quid.

Loughton was easily weeded out – he had used his parliamentary email address to sign up and left a comment saying he would “vote for Jeremy Corbyn and consign Labour to oblivion for a generation” – but he told The Guardian he had only done it “to make a point about how ridiculous the whole open exercise is”. Considering he only succeeded in giving Labour £3, it is not exactly clearly what this point is.

Despite concerns about widespread entryism, only around “40 to 50” registered supporters have been rejected, according to a party source. It seems many of the Tories boasting online about signing up have not, in fact, followed through with it.