Why has Labour’s leadership election descended into a row about dirty tricks?

The party HQ is neutral in the contest. But many of its staff are fiercely loyal to Corbyn, writes Andrew Grice

Sir Keir Starmer’s campaign has been reported to the Information Commissioner (Getty)

For the most part, Labour’s leadership contest has avoided personal attacks. The candidates have been criticised by some commentators for pulling their punches on Jeremy Corbyn, even though he led the party to its worst defeat since 1935.

However, the gloves came off yesterday. Labour Party headquarters has reported the campaign of the frontrunner Sir Keir Starmer to the Information Commissioner for an alleged breach of data protection rules. Two members of Sir Keir’s team are said to have “scraped” (hacked into) Labour’s 500,000-plus membership list.

His team dismissed this as “utter nonsense”. It claimed the staffers clicked on a link in an email sent out by a rival candidate, and found it could access the party’s list. Sir Keir’s campaign then alerted Labour HQ, whose response was to refer the campaign to the commissioner.