I've never taken viagra nor voted to privatise NHS says '˜Blair-lite' Corbyn rival

Responding to attacks from Jeremy Corbyn’s supporters who branded him “Blair-lite”, the former shadow work and pensions secretary said he was committed to a free health service.

Opponents have pointed to his time as a lobbyist for drug firm Pfizer in 2005 when he said choice was a good thing in the NHS.

Can unions broker deal to save Corbyn?

Asked if he used the word ‘choice’ to advocate part-privatisation, Mr Smith said: “No, that’s clearly not true, and it’s a gross exaggeration, and extrapolation, of one comment in a press release about a report commissioned by Pfizer before I worked there, at a period in which the last Labour government was using a word like ‘choice’ to describe getting private providers to do hip and knee and cataract operations.

“So, I have never advocated privatisation of the NHS,” Mr Smith told BBC Radio Four’s Today programme.

The MP also told ITV’s Good Morning Britain that he has never used Pfizer’s most famous product Viagra.

The Welsh MP, who is the sole challenger to Mr Corbyn after he received more support in the parliamentary party than former shadow business secretary Angela Eagle, said he fully backed the NHS.

“I believe in a 100% publicly owned NHS free at the point of use. It has been one of Labour’s profoundest achievements. I grew up swaddled in stories of the Labour Party creating the NHS.

“There are obviously already many services in the NHS that are provided by private providers, there are a hell of a lot more of them now because of the way the current Tory government has twisted some of the words of the last Labour government.

“Broadly speaking, we made a mistake, the last Labour government, in not appreciating how a Tory government would ride a coach and horses through the language. In employing words like ‘choice’ I think we allowed them to use that as a Trojan horse to try and marketise the NHS. I’m opposed to that.”

The comments came as the South Wales Echo reproduced an interview with Mr Smith from 2006 in which he said the private sector could “bring good ideas” into the NHS.

In the interview Mr Smith said he did not know if he would have voted against the Iraq war if he had been an MP at the time of the decision.

“I thought at the time the tradition of the Labour Party and the tradition of left-wing engagement to remove dictators was a noble, valuable tradition.”

Mr Smith said that if he ousted Mr Corbyn from the leadership, he would like him to retain a prominent role in Labour.

“Jeremy has still got a lot to say for the Labour Party, but I don’t think Jeremy is a leader. I don’t think he’s a leader in parliament, but I do think he’s got a lot to say for Labour. I would absolutely want him to take a role like president, or chairman, as we have had in the past,” he told the BBC.

Mr Smith said he was embarrassed that he called 999 for a police response to a story when he was a BBC journalist, but blamed the incident on a “bullying” culture at the broadcaster.

The deadline to secure a vote in the Labour leadership contest will be passed at 5pm on Wednesday, with celebrities including author JK Rowling urging moderates to pay £25 in the hope of removing Mr Corbyn.

But Mr Corbyn too was making a last-minute drive to get his backers to sign up, and thousands of new supporters are expected to rush to register for a vote in the last hours before the electorate is finalised.

A trade union is considering legal action over the decision by the party’s ruling National Executive Committee barring an estimated 130,000 new members who joined after January 12 from voting.