Read his lips: British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn denies calling PM Theresa May a ‘stupid woman’ – so what did he really say?
- A flurry of lip-reading followed Jeremy Corbyn’s unheard comment in the House of Commons – but he says he said ‘stupid people’, not ‘stupid woman’
Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the UK’s main opposition Labour Party, denied calling Prime Minister Theresa May a “stupid woman” on Wednesday as Britain’s Parliament descended into angry scenes of insult-slinging and accusations of sexism.
Corbyn was hauled back to the House of Commons to explain himself after he was caught on camera muttering a phrase under his breath. Members of May’s Conservative Party accused him of calling the premier a “stupid woman” but the noise of the Commons chamber meant his words could not be heard in the video.
“I did not use the words ‘stupid woman’ about the prime minister or anyone else,” Corbyn told the Commons, he had said “stupid people,” he told lawmakers. “I am completely opposed to the use of sexist or misogynist language in any form.”
The Tories were not buying it, and insisted Corbyn should apologise to May.
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The incident provoked uproar at the end of a fraught and bad-tempered year in British politics in which May’s government has repeatedly clashed with Parliament over her Brexit plans. The Commons has been in a frenzied state for weeks after a series of tense encounters over the UK’s divorce from the EU and an attempted leadership coup against May.
The angry scenes will do little to help the prime minister secure the cross-party agreement she wants for her deal with Brussels, although she won support from politicians on her own side who are usually among her fiercest Brexit critics.