Owen Smith: A Corbyn victory means Labour would be “culpable” for year more Tory housing failures

Owen Smith today steps up his attack on Jeremy Corbyn by claiming that more than 100,000 families will be left homeless if the leader is re-elected and the Tories remain in power “until at least 2025”.

The challenger says that Labour’s leadership election means the party “will be culpable for what the Tories do” if it chooses “protest” over the need to improve the lives of millions of British people.

The doom-laden warning could prompt dismay among Corbyn-supporting Labour members but indicates centrists’ fears over for the party as well as a shift in tactics – linking a victory for the left to specific Tory failures – in the final days of the contest.

Smith lays out the threat to housebuilding and provision of homes if Britain were to face the further years of Tory government which he said would be delivered if “weak leader” Corbyn is re-elected.

“If Jeremy continues as leader, I really fear that the Tories will be in power until at least 2025. If the Tories appalling record on housing continues, then we’ll have a shortage of 1.8 million homes by 2025; the last of our social housing will be sold off; and more than 100,000 families will be left homeless,” Smith says today.

“Labour cannot turn a blind eye and allow the Tories to condemn thousands more people to a life on the streets or without a home they can call their own. We have to be a credible government-in-waiting and win the next election.

“That’s what at stake in this leadership election – it’s a straight choice between protest and government, complaining about things or actually improving people’s lives. Labour will be culpable for what the Tories do if we choose the former.”

Corbyn has not so far responded to the claims but remains comfortably ahead in the opinion polls for the leadership contest.