Corbyn and Sultana clash over new party

An extraordinary split opened between Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana in the formation of their leftwing party yesterday, with the former Labour leader suggesting he would take legal action over an unauthorised membership portal promoted by his co-leader.

- Aletha Adu

Sultana claimed the party was being run by a "sexist boys' club" and suggested there were deep disagreements over how to launch party membership - including with the four other MPs in Corbyn's Independent Alliance. The split emerged yesterday when Sultana revealed a new membership portal on X, urging supporters to "be a part of history".

Within half an hour she celebrated "10,000 paid-up members" and reassured her followers that the site was "safe and secure", encouraging them to keep trying to sign up despite "issues due to such high traffic". By early afternoon, Sultana said numbers had hit 20,000, dismissing suggestions from those she classed as "rightwing bad faith actors" who were claiming "this link is fake".

Sultana posted about the portal three times before Corbyn issued an "urgent message" telling his followers on X to ignore the site and saying "legal advice is being taken".

"This morning, an unauthorised email was sent to all yourparty.uk supporters with details of a supposed membership portal hosted in a new domain name," Corbyn said. "Legal advice is being taken. That email should be ignored by all supporters.

If direct debits have been set up, they should immediately be cancelled." The clash is the most dramatic in a series of tensions that have plagued the project since its launch in July.