Gang of Eight

In UK politics, the Gang of Eight was a breakaway group of eight Blairite or "soft left", Labour MPs many of whom were prominent Labour politicians, who resigned the Labour whip to join the Libdems in October 2018 in protest to the perceived radicalism of Jeremy Corbyn's leadership, as well as the alleged mishandling of antisemitism complaints in the party.

The term Gang of Eight is a reference to the Gang of Four, four moderate Labour politicians who left the party in 1981 to form the Social Democratic Party as a response to the similarly criticised leadership of then-Labour leader Michael Foot.

Background
Following Labour's worse-than-expected results in the 2015 general election, which saw the party make a net loss of 61 on their 2010 results, Ed Miliband resigned as Labour leader, triggering a leadership election. In the election, Islington North MP Jeremy Corbyn, who was considered to be on the left-wing fringe of the party, was elected leader of the Labour Party in a shock victory.

Throughout Corbyn's time as leader, the Labour Party was repeatedly under fire for allegations of antisemitism, and consistently polled well behind the Conservatives. Despite minor gains in the 2018 local elections, after George Osborne's election as Conservative leader, Labour remained up to 20 points behind the Conservatives in opinion polling. This raised growing questions around Corbyn's electability, with the antisemitism allegations, the party's staunchly left-wing platform, and Corbyn's unpopularity raised as potential issues. In June 2018, Labour lost the previously safe seat of Lewisham East to the Liberal Democrats in a by-election.

In the aftermath of this by-election, there was renewed speculation over Corbyn's electability and likelihood to lead the party at the next election. This was compounded further when in August, Shadow Foreign Secretary Hilary Benn, a longtime critic of Corbyn, contacted members of the shadow cabinet to inform them he had lost confidence in Corbyn. He was subsequently sacked as Shadow Foreign Secretary, triggering a series of Shadow Cabinet resignations in which over 20 separate shadow ministers resigned. Corbyn assembled a new Shadow Cabinet, and insisted he would not resign. On 5 September a vote of no confidence was held in Corbyn's leadership, with Corbyn losing the vote by 159 to 25 with five spoilt ballots and three absentees. However, as Labour Party rules did not require that Corbyn resign as a consequence of the vote, he remained in post and reiterated his insistence against resigning. As a result of the resignations, Corbyn's Shadow Cabinet had to be reduced in size from 31 to 23, and there were unconfirmed reports in the media that as many as 40 Labour MPs were preparing to defect to another party or form their own.

On 6 October 2018, Luciana Berger, MP for Liverpool Wavertree, became the first MP to resign the Labour whip, and announced that she had left the party to join the Liberal Democrats, citing concerns over Corbyn's electability and radicalism, as well as antisemitism within the party. In the following few days, she was joined by seven other MPs, who were dubbed "The Gang of Eight" in a Guardian article on 11 October.

The Gang of Eight would be joined by around 40 other Labour MPs, peers and former politicians in the following months.

Aftermath
Immediately following the MPs defection, there was a surge in support for the Liberal Democrats in the polls, with one poll placing the party 2% ahead of the Conservatives on 35%, with Labour on just 18%. One of the Eight, Sir Keir Starmer would go onto stand for leader of the Liberal Democrats in the Jan 2019 leadership election against Ed Davey, winning narrowly. In the 2019 general election, six of the eight defectors would stand as Liberal Democrat candidates, (although not all stood in their old seats), of which only one would win, Emily Thornberry, becoming the MP for Hornsey and Wood Green (she had served as MP for Islington South and Finsbury at the time of her defection).