The government won by nine votes. 37 Labour MPs rebelled (thanks comrades), I'm sure many Labour Party members will be keen to see which lefties caved and voted with the government on this.

Hopefully the Lords will chuck it out - I never thought I'd hear myself say that.

John McDonnell:

Any attempt to present this as some sort of victory for the Government will ring absolutely hollow. There will be widespread consternation among our supporters in the country seeing a Labour Government prepared to use every tactic available in its determination to crush essential civil liberties, which have been won by the Labour movement over generations.

This is no way to run a Government. Securing votes by threats, bribes and personal pleading demeans the role of the Prime Minister. Backbench Labour MPs from all sides of the Party have looked on in disbelief at how the Government has mishandled this issue.

Now some trade unions are talking about cutting funding to Labour MPs who vote against trade union policies, hopefully some Labour Party members will start thinking about deselecting their MPs who are caving into the leadership's demands. We need more reliable socialists in the Parliamentary Labour Party, who don't throw their principles out the window the second Gordon phones them up.