Jeremy Corbyn free to contest Labour leadership after High Court decision

Jeremy Corbyn will not have to win the support of 51 MPs to contest the Labour leadership, as a High Court case was dismissed on Thursday that freed him to take on the challenge of Owen Smith.

The current Labour party leader has come under overwhelming pressure in the last month to resign after a host of resignations from his Shadow Cabinet following the after-effects of Britain's vote to leave the European Union.

A case was brought by former parliamentary candidate Michael Foster that Corbyn would have to secure the support of 51 MPs to stand in a leadership contest. However, Mr Justice Foskett upheld Labour's NEC decision to allow Corbyn to run without the support, as there is no vacancy in the leadership.

The ruling now sets up a direct confrontation between Corbyn and Smith, the former having the support of most of the party's grassroot members, and the latter being backed by most Labour MPs.

The current leader of the party welcomed the decision, saying the case was “a waste of time and resources when our party should have been holding the government to account”.

Corbyn said that the will of the Labour members who elected him as leader should not have even been doubted at any stage.

“There should have been no question of the right of half a million Labour party members to choose their own leader being overturned," he added. "If anything, the aim should be to expand the number of voters in this election."

172 of the party's 212 MPs voted no confidence in their leader in a recent non-binding vote, plunging Labour into a deeply divided party when the time seemed ripe to attack an equally-divided Conservative party.

Owen Smith has welcomed the court's decision, saying that it has now "put to bed any questions about the process, so we can get on with discussing the issues that really matter.”