Tom Watson bats off speech heckler with ease at Labour conference

Deputy leader suggests heckler 'didn't get the memo' about stopping the bickering

Tom Watson delivers his keynote speech to delegates at the Labour Party conference in Liverpool (Getty)

Labour deputy leader Tom Watson has mocked Jeremy Corbyn’s call for unity after being heckled by a woman in the crowd.

Speaking at the conference in Liverpool, the MP urged the party to stop trashing its own legacy in government but was interrupted by a persistent heckler shouting “Chilcot”.

Midway through his speech, Mr Watson broke off and turned to Mr Corbyn to say “Jeremy, I don’t think she got the unity memo” to a roar of laughter and a standing ovation.

Mr Corbyn, who did not laugh at his deputy’s joke, had previously called for unity in his victory speech after winning Saturday’s leadership contest.

He promised to try to build a new relationship with the MPs, whose vote of no confidence forced the second leadership contest in a year.

He said: "We owe it to the millions of people Labour exists to represent to end the sniping and personal attacks, and work together for all those who depend on the election of a Labour government.

“Anything else would be destructive self-indulgence.”

Relations between the leadership and the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) have been fraught since the bid to oust Mr Corbyn in June.

Labour MPs claim that Mr Corbyn’s perceived lacklustre performance during the campaign was the reason so many of the party’s supporters opted for Brexit.

Following the unsuccessful coup, there have been rumours that Mr Watson could be ousted by Mr Corbyn’s supporters but the deputy leader - who is also directly elected by the membership - said there was no appetite for another bruising internal party election.

Earlier this month it emerged that Mr Watson was supposedly on a “hit list” of MPs accused of abusing party colleagues, leaked by Mr Corbyn’s campaign team.

But Mr Watson said both Mr Corbyn and shadow Chancellor John McDonnell had assured him that the reports were not accurate.

He said: “When you have these internal elections, you get a lot of hotheads on the campaign team and they can generate a lot of negative headlines in newspapers.

“As far as I know, Jeremy does not want to plunge the Labour party into another summer of misery when it comes to naval gazing and having an internal election.”