Labour drops legal proceedings against Corbyn-era staff over leaked report

Labour has dropped legal proceedings against five former staff members from the Corbyn era.

The five, including Jeremy Corbyn’s former chief of staff Karie Murphy and Corbyn’s former director of communications Seumas Milne, had faced accusations of leaking a report shortly after Keir Starmer became Labour leader – something which they all denied.

The report claimed that complaints about antisemitism were deliberately mishandled by party staffers to undermine Jeremy Corbyn and contained WhatsApp messages sent between staff critical of the former Labour leader.

However, leaked documents appeared to show that Labour was warned that the internal report gave an intentionally “misleading picture” and had accessed messages through a “clear and unacceptable breach of confidence”.

The report was originally intended to be a submission from the Labour Party to the Equality and Human Rights Commission, which had launched an investigation into antisemitism in the party, but it was not sent to the EHRC on the basis of legal advice.

In October 2021, Labour named and accused five former party staffers of leaking the report, namely Seumus Milne, Karie Murphy, Georgie Robertson, Harry Hayball and Laura Murray.

However, the party has now dropped proceedings against the five former staffers.

In a joint statement from the party and the former staff members’ lawyers, they said: “The party is discontinuing its legal claims against Karie Murphy, Seumas Milne, Georgie Robertson, Harry Hayball and Laura Murray on a ‘no order as to costs’ basis.

“The five welcome the resolution of the claims.”

Martin Forde KC, the lawyer who carried out a wide-ranging report into the culture of the Labour Party, told the BBC: “It is a great shame that money has been spent on legal fees that could have been spent on the general election.”

A spokesman for Momentum branded the legal action as a “gigantic waste of members’ money”.

He said: “Millions of pounds that could have been spent on campaigning in key seats has instead been poured down the drain, all driven by factional obsession.”