Jeremy Corbyn heard ordering John McDonnell to 'wave!' to applauding conference crowd

'Give them a wave, John. WAVE'

John McDonnell, the shadow Chancellor, with party leader Jeremy Corbyn, after his speech to the Labour conference on Monday (Getty)

Labour’s build-up to Jeremy Corbyn’s keynote conference speech today has been all about the party’s new style of “grassroots” politics with the power spread around.

But a clip from the end of shadow Chancellor John McDonnell’s major address on the economy yesterday shows that it is still very much Mr Corbyn who is running things.

Mr McDonnell received widespread plaudits for the way he set out Labour’s “aggressive” alternative to the austerity favoured by the Tories.

He ended his speech with a rousing cry of “Solidarity!” and was met with rapturous applause, before he was joined on stage by Mr Corbyn himself.

Not happy with Mr McDonnell’s ability to respond to the reaction himself, however, the party leader even stage-managed that. He can be heard saying: “Give them a wave John. Wave! Thank you.”

Earlier on Tuesday morning, shadow Education Secretary Lucy Powell told ITV’s Good Morning Britain that the new leader’s style was “very open, very democratic, listening to people and taking their advice”.

And speaking in the build-up to Mr Corbyn’s speech in Brighton, shadow minister without portfolio Jonathan Ashworth said Mr Corbyn was building Labour into “a grassroots movement in every constituency”.

“Under Jeremy's leadership we are changing,” he said.