Jeremy Corbyn is taking legal action against a Tory Councillor who tweeted a doctored image of the former Labour leader supposedly placing a wreath at the scene of Sunday’s bombing in Liverpool.
On Monday evening, Paul Nickerson – a Tory Councillor for the East Riding ward on Yorkshire Council – came under huge criticism after posting a fake image portraying Mr Corbyn laying a wreath at the scene of the exploded taxi outside Liverpool Women’s Hospital.
Nickerson captioned the doctored image with the word “Unsurprisingly”.
Following a huge backlash against the tweet, Nickerson eventually deleted it and issued an “unreserved apology”.
However, Nickerson also attempted to claim that his account had been hacked, and that the tweet was actually posted by friends playing a prank.
Nickerson’s claims came despite his account also posting numerous replies to people complaining about his tweet, and his account blocking numerous Twitter users who confronted him.
And, to make matters worse, previous tweets in which the Tory Councillor had called for people to be “temper” their language towards politicians emerged – pouring even more irony into the fiasco he had created.
A story about Tories in two pictures. pic.twitter.com/UFBpSzWM4y
— Evolve Politics (@evolvepolitics) November 16, 2021
Unsurprisingly, Nickerson was yesterday suspended from East Riding Conservative group pending an investigation into the tweet.
However, today it has emerged that Jeremy Corbyn now intends to sue the suspended Councillor over the tweet.
In a short statement to his local paper, the Islington Gazette, Mr Corbyn said:
“My solicitor has been notified and we are taking legal action.”
The pending legal action against Mr Nickerson would also not be the first meted out by Mr Corbyn in response to false tweets.
In February 2018, Tory MP Ben Bradley was forced to make a humiliating apology and make a large donation to charity on behalf of Mr Corbyn after posting a tweet falsely accusing the then Labour leader of “selling British secrets to Communist spies.”
On the 19th of February I made a defamatory statement about @jeremycorbyn. I have apologised to Mr Corbyn and here is the complete text of my apology. Please retweet. pic.twitter.com/6JZc8O9E82
— Cllr Ben Bradley MP (@BBradley_Mans) February 24, 2018
Supporters of Mr Corbyn have also raised more than £370,000 for a legal fighting fund to aid the former Labour leader in any future legal action – meaning his pending case against Mr Nickerson definitely won’t be hampered by a shortage of funds.
