We’re fairly sure Jeremy Corbyn can’t really walk on water – leader comment

An ally of Jeremy Corbyn, Karie Murphy, has claimed the Labour leader likes to go on trains to “obscure” places like Orkney, inadvertently implying he is capable of pulling off a miracle.

Get ready. A general election is just round the corner and that means gaffe-watchers will be going into overdrive. Spin doctors of all parties will be desperately trying to talk up any opponent’s faux pas, even if it wasn’t one really, while equally desperately trying to talk down their own.

So perhaps Karie Murphy, a close ally of Jeremy Corbyn, was just trying to get in a quick bout of pre-match practice when she spoke of how the Labour leader “loves to go on trains to obscure places in the middle of nowhere whether it’s the South West or whether it’s Orkney”.

Cue much hilarity with the best riposte coming from Orkney and Shetland MP Alistair Carmichael who tweeted about his hopes for a visit by Corbyn, saying “presumably Karie Murphy expects him to walk the rest of the way” from Thurso’s train station.

Putting Corbyn’s alleged ability to walk on water aside, a few careless, rather silly words should never settle an election. Who among us has never said something we didn’t quite mean? However, as gaffes go, writing off large swathes of the country as “obscure” really is going to take some beating.