Jeremy Corbyn highlights life expectancy gap in drive against poverty

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn told a rally at a Glasgow brewery that many people in the city do not live to see their 60th birthday.

He spoke to a crowd of around 250 people at Drygate in the east end which is known for its poverty and low life expectancy

The event was targeted at younger voters who might frequent the brewery, known for its craft beers.

He said: “There’s a million people living in poverty. There’s 260,000 children in Scotland living in poverty.

“There’s health inequality in this great city of Glasgow which means for every mile you go eastwards from the centre your life expectancy falls and falls and falls.

“Many people in Glasgow don’t live to see their 60th birthday. Why? Poverty, bad housing, health and inequality all those issues. It’s the worst figure for may parts of the whole of the country.

“Do you deal with that by just seeing it as a statistic or something to put in a PHD thesis or something to just reflect upon or do you see it as a challenge to all of us?”

He was joined at the brewery by Scottish Labour leader Kezia Dugdale who earlier joined him on a tour of a former school in the east end which is being redeveloped as offices and a community space.

Ms Dugdale joked about the location of the evening event and revealed Mr Corbyn is to target marginal seats during his tour.

She said: “They said it couldn’t be done, they said it was impossible, but tonight we’ve proven it, Labour can organise a piss-up in a brewery.

“I’m delighted to welcome Jeremy to Glasgow. He is going to spend the next three days touring Scotland, 18 marginal seats across five days in total because that’s his commitment to making sure we can win here again in the weeks and months ahead so we can get the Tories out of office.”

Earlier in the day Mr Corbyn said the SNP failed to use its powers to mitigate austerity and argued his party would tackle “third-world” levels of poverty in parts of Scotland. He said if Labour gained power it would ensure Scotland is funded “the way it should be”.

He added: “The SNP government has the powers if it wants to use them to mitigate the effects of austerity, they chose not to. This ward where we are standing now has a very low life expectancy, lower in many cities than what we choose to call the third world.

“It’s not right and we deal with these things with a public commitment to invest in decent housing, opportunities for young people and good-quality jobs.”

SNP MSP Joan McAlpine, who convenes Holyrood’s Europe Committee said: “Jeremy Corbyn and Kezia Dugdale’s claims about being on the side of those in work are utterly bogus if they persist in backing the Tories’ plans to leave the European single market. Instead, they should follow common sense and reverse their position.

“They have a chance today to lay out a different approach and to back the SNP’s sensible proposals for the UK to remain within the single market, protecting jobs, incomes, living standards and investment.”