For a beleaguered Keir Starmer, his former boss Jeremy Corbyn is turning into the political equivalent of one of those movie villains who simply refuses to be defeated.
Despite being effectively thrown out of the party, Corbyn managed to get re-elected last year as an independent in the neighbouring seat to Starmer in north London.
But now his plan to create a new party on the left with another Labour exile, Zarah Sultana, looks like it could be more than just a chaotic vanity project.
Essentially, Corbyn and Sultana would be uniting a new political force which emerged during the 2024 election and was roughly known as the pro-Gaza independents.
Apart from Corbyn himself, four of the pro-Gaza Independents were elected in 2024 and many more came very close, tapping into support in seats with high Muslim populations.
Frontbencher Jon Ashworth, who looked as though he was destined for the cabinet, lost his Leicester South seat, while health secretary Wes Streeting only survived a challenge from one of these independents in Ilford North with a majority of 528.
Others to squeak through were justice secretary Shabana Mahmood and home office minister Jess Phillips.
But more to the point, Labour is no longer polling at 33 per cent – the national share of the vote they got to win the last election – but 10 points below that.
Sultana, Corbyn and the Gaza Independents are still very much motivated by Israel and the Middle East but also have a renewed domestic socialist agenda on the welfare cuts Starmer has proposed, and the desire to bring in wealth taxes.
As we saw in the massive rebellion earlier this week on welfare, there is a lot of sympathy for this position in the Labour ranks and if rebels are to lose the whip or be turfed out of the party, then Corbyn and Sultana may give them a welcome home.
Polling has suggested it would get 8 per cent national support as a start, more than enough to start eating into Labour majorities and splitting the vote on the left.
Perhaps the only person who will be laughing will be Nigel Farage whose hopes of winning a majority with Reform UK can only be helped by a split leftwing vote.
That said, it could also be bad news for Farage. Reform has relied heavily on the so-called “anti-politics vote”, the people unhappy with the mainstream parties looking for an alternative.
Corbyn has always appealed to many in this group as much as Farage and they could end up fishing for support in the same pool even if their policies are miles apart.
