Eddie Izzard, you won't make a difference if you join Labour's NEC – they're part of the problem on Brexit

In the Momentum wing of the Labour Party, there is a chilling intolerance which refuses to accept that another faction – let alone another party – might occasionally have a useful idea

The comedian and political activist has announced his intentions to stand again for Labour executive today (Shutterstock)

I’ve been a fan of Eddie Izzard since school. All you have to do is say “Le singe est sur la branche” to me and I am liable to fall about in stitches. So it is always with genuine interest that I follow his career updates – the latest being that he wants to be elected to Labour’s National Executive Committee.

But I must confess that his pitch for the post did bring a wry smile to my face.

A smile because the fan in me was pleased to see that in fact we are on the same side on many of the issues. He said he was fighting for a party that was “open and tolerant”. The Liberal Democrat strapline for the last couple of years has been that we should make Britain “open, tolerant and united”. Make of him not going so far as saying “united” what you will.

And wry because I don’t envy his task – I can’t imagine there will be many laughs in that job, especially as this will be the centre of grim plotting between the different factions fighting for the soul of the post-Corbyn Labour Party.

You see, his views are yet another example of how the left needs to set aside our swords and do whatever we can to advance our common cause. So much of what he said, I’ve been saying for years too. The need to have more working class, BAME, LGBT and disabled people as candidates is as desperate for the Liberal Democrats as it is for Labour if we are to make our politics look – and more importantly, act – in the interests of the society we seek to represent.

It is tempting to point out that such a policy prospectus is perhaps not too high on the agenda of the Labour MP Jared O’Mara, who has been accused of saying staggeringly appalling things about women, gay people and most recently, the Spanish – but let us accept he does not speak for his party on many of these issues.

Nevertheless, in elements of the Momentum wing of the Labour Party, there is a chilling intolerance which refuses to accept that another faction – let alone another party – might occasionally have a useful idea.

The more I hear about Eddie Izzard’s political agenda, the more sympathetic I feel. I cheer him on in his cause, but I fear he faces an uphill battle. He led a heroic (if doomed) campaign for electoral reform, which Labour failed to support. Above all, he is a passionate pro-European who, as I understand it, thinks it would be a tragedy for Britain to crash out of the EU.

Yet it has been Labour that has made Brexit possible, trotting obediently through the division lobbies supporting Theresa May’s extreme Brexit. Jeremy Corbyn even sacked three members of the Shadow Cabinet for daring to think it was their job, as an opposition, to oppose the Tory government on Brexit.

This is not just the biggest issue of the day; it is the fight of our generation. Our children, whose futures could be devastated by Brexit, will have every right to ask: “So whose side were you on in the great Brexit battle, Mummy and Daddy?” That is all the more pertinent when you consider how weak and divided this Government is, lacking as it does a majority.

A united, functional opposition really could stop Brexit. There comes a point when you have to ask: is Labour part of the solution on Brexit, or part of the problem?

Tony Blair was right when he said there was a split in the progressive traditions of British politics throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. And far from closing, these differences are growing more pronounced with self-declared Marxists moving Labour ever further from its social democrat traditions.

But here’s the thing: in the battle between Leninism and Liberalism, Eddie Izzard sounds far more like a liberal to me. He respects the rights of individuals, and their liberties. He does not, if I understand his politics correctly, think that the individual should be trampled over for some perceived “greater good”, which has always been the default position of the hard left.

Eddie Izzard Labour? The more you think about it, the more sense it makes. Eddie for leader? I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s thinking it.

But if that doesn’t work out – and while I am sure to be laughed at – I think Eddie would be more at home with me in the Liberal Democrats: the party that really is open, tolerant – and united.

Layla Moran is the Liberal Democrat MP for Oxford West and Abingdon