An important speech from Jeremy Corbyn – but made at the wrong time

The debate about whether Government policy has increased the risk of terrorism is a legitimate one, but it was an error of judgement to raise it today

Jeremy Corbyn, a candidate to be prime minister in less than two weeks, delivered a statesmanlike speech on terrorism today. There was much in it that was welcome. He called for more resources and reform in our prisons, which are often not just colleges of crime but madrassas of a species of terrorism “falsely drawing authority from Islamic beliefs”, as he correctly put it.

He was right to question whether the recent cuts in police numbers might have had an effect on the ability of the services working against terrorism to protect the public. The visible deployment of soldiers at some locations this week – something that has not been deemed necessary before – does suggest that police numbers may have been cut too deeply. But he was wrong to do so today.

The Independent is all for the resumption of election campaigning. One of the ways in which we can demonstrate to the terrorist the resilience of our values is to have the vigorous contention of democracy carry on. As Mr Corbyn himself said in his speech, “for the rest of this election campaign, we must be out there demonstrating what they would take away: our freedom; our democracy; our support for one another”.

But it was poorly calculated on Mr Corbyn’s part – in this speech, his first in the resumption of campaigning – to use the Manchester bombing to make a party political attack on the Government. He paid his respects to the victims of Monday night’s horror and to their families; he thanked the emergency services; and he called for unity. That was enough.

If he then wanted to engage in electioneering, he could have resumed the case against Theresa May’s proposals for social care, which was the subject under discussion before murder intervened, and on which Labour seemed to be winning the argument.

Similarly, although Mr Corbyn was right to call for “an informed understanding of the causes of terrorism”, it was a mistake to point to the “connections between wars our government has supported or fought in other countries, such as Libya, and terrorism here at home”. Despite his repeated protestation that his argument “in no way reduces the guilt of those who attack our children”, he must have known that this is precisely how it would be interpreted.

He said, four days after 22 people were killed in Manchester, that there was a “connection” between government policy and terrorism. That may be a legitimate argument. It was, indeed, one of the arguments made by The Independent when it opposed Britain’s part in the Iraq war 14 years ago.

Some will say that foreign wars are merely an excuse for an Islamist ideology that hates the West, and that 9/11 came before the most controversial wars. Others will say that, even so, those conflicts increase the risks of terrorism here. Even Ms May is thought to have had her doubts about David Cameron’s part in the intervention in Libya in 2011. But it is not an argument that Mr Corbyn should be engaged in now, while the threat level is still critical and the investigation into the bombing is live and developing.

Indeed, in his interview with Andrew Neil on the BBC he seemed to retreat a little, suggesting that the problem was merely the creation of an ungoverned space in Libya.

However, even to hint that the Government might bear some responsibility for allowing the bombing to happen is a mistake when the country is looking for reassurance. Others can argue about police spending cuts or the effects of foreign policy over the years, but now is not the time for the Leader of the Opposition to be doing so, especially when seeking election to the premiership.

These are important questions, but they have their time and place. Mr Corbyn has once again showed poor judgement.