Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has promised to scrap the House of Lords as the Labour leadership contest enters its final stages
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has vowed to scrap the appointed House of Lords as the party's leadership contest enters its final furlongs.
Ballots for the leadership election will be sent out from today, with the party expected to announce its leader in a special conference on 24 September.
This weekend London mayor Sadiq Khan waded back into the contest to back Corbyn's challenger, former shadow work and pensions secretary Owen Smith.
Smith has also won the backing of Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale, but remains the outsider in the contest.
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Today, Corbyn is seeking to press his advantage with proposals to extend devolution measures across Britain, and close the appointed House of Lords.
The Labour leader said he would replace the Lords with an elected chamber, as well as offering up further devolution to regional and local bodies and the creation of new "citizens' assemblies".
It comes less than a month after Corbyn nominated Labour anti-Semitism report author and human rights campaigner Shami Chakrabarti for a peerage.
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"Decisions in Britain are overwhelmingly taken from the top down. And that’s crucial to why our country is run in the interests of a privileged few,” Corbyn said.
"That has to change – so that the country works in the interests of the millions, and not just the millionaires.”
Unexpectedly, the Labour leader's rhetoric echoes that of Theresa May, who has repeatedly pledged to fight injustice since being chosen as the UK's new Prime Minister and Conservative party leader.
In her first speech as Prime Minister, May said she sought to address people who were "just managing".
"When we take the big calls, we will think not of the powerful, but you," May said.
Both have also vowed to give employees a better say in the organisations they work for – although May has done so by suggesting board-participation, while Corbyn is calling for mandatory collective bargaining.