SCOTTISH Labour leader Kezia Dugdale insisted she was “consistent and very clear” that the party could win a general election under Jeremy Corbyn, despite having previously said he could not appeal to enough voters to take them back into government.

Dugdale’s remarks on the opening day of Labour’s annual conference in Liverpool came a day after she suggested Corbyn could not win in 2020 just minutes following his re-election as UK party leader.

Dugdale came under fire at the weekend from supporters of Corbyn for her response to his victory speech in which he offered to “wipe the slate clean”.

She said: “Jeremy can unite the Labour Party, but he needs to want to unite it.

“That means he needs to work with both the party across the country and MPs to provide an effective opposition to the Tories in Westminster.

“It will be a difficult task for Jeremy, but not an impossible one. Likewise, the Parliamentary Labour Party must recognise that a divided Labour Party serves no one. We can’t fight the Tories when we are fighting each other.”

During the Labour leadership campaign, Dugdale publicly endorsed Corbyn’s challenger, Welsh MP Owen Smith, writing in August: “I don’t think Jeremy can unite our party and lead us into government. He cannot appeal to a broad enough section of voters to win an election.”

However, yesterday Dugdale pulled back from her earlier position and insisted Labour could defeat the Conservatives in 2020 if it is a “unified fighting force”, and pledged to work with the newly re-elected UK leader to work towards that.

Speaking to BBC’s Sunday Politics Scotland, Dugdale said: “The job now for the Labour Party is to unite behind Jeremy Corbyn. I believe he can unite the Labour Party. He has to want to unite the Labour Party and equally my colleagues the Labour MPs in Westminster have to want that too.

“It’s easy to say those words. It’s time for unity, the hard business now of making it happen is what happens next.”

Pressed on her support for the UK leader, she added: “We’ve had a leadership contest, that has now concluded. Jeremy Corbyn has a mandate to lead the UK Labour Party. I respect that.

“His job and his duty now is to unite the Labour Party and I believe he can do that, but he has to want to do that, and I’m going to work with him to that end, equally, Labour MPs have to do likewise.”

Speaking from the Labour conference in Liverpool, Dugdale said: “I’ve been absolutely consistent and very clear. I believe Jeremy Corbyn can unite the Labour Party, he has to want to do that, though. Those are easy words, the reality of making it happen is the job of us all to do next.”

Dugdale added that Corbyn could send a “great signal” to those MPs who have opposed him by restoring elections to the shadow cabinet, which is currently chosen by the leader.

“There is a case for having some form of shadow cabinet elections,” Dugdale said.

However, the imminently expected reshuffle of Corbyn’s shadow cabinet looks set to go ahead without Labour MPs being granted a vote on the make-up of the leader’s top team.

The party’s ruling National Executive Committee has agreed to put off a decision on shadow cabinet elections until an “awayday” on November 22, with a consultation process to follow before reforms are approved at a special conference.

Corbyn’s re-election with an increased majority on Saturday has heightened expectations of a reshuffle, and Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell did not rule out the possibility of frontbench changes ahead of the return of Parliament next month.

Asked on ITV1’s Peston on Sunday whether he expected the shadow cabinet be the same when MPs return to Westminster, McDonnell said: “I think so. But there might be others that say, ‘I want to do a particular role’. If they want to come on board before that, that’s fine.”

However, Corbyn moved to calm anxiety about the threat of deselection of MPs who sought to oust him, insisting that the “vast majority” will have no problems as local parties choose candidates for new and altered constituencies created by the redrawing of boundaries.

Speaking to BBC1’s Andrew Marr Show, Corbyn said: “Let’s have a democratic discussion and, I think, the vast majority of MPs will have no problem whatsoever.”

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