George Galloway could be readmitted to Labour, says spokesman

“The only circumstance in which that can be changed is if the local CLP [constituency Labour Party] requests it and the decision is then with the National Executive Committee.”

On Tuesday, Andrew Murray, the senior Unite official who helped run  Mr Corbyn’s general election campaign, urged the party to think again over Mr Galloway.

Mr Murray said  it was “long past time” for the “vicious, illegal and disgraceful decision to expel George Galloway from the Labour Party” to be overturned.

Mr Galloway, 63, was expelled after 16 years as a Labour MP in 2003 after he called on British troops fighting in the Iraq war to defy their orders.

But he remained closely involved with the Stop The War coalition alongside founder member and chairman Mr Corbyn.

After his expulsion Mr Galloway served as a Respect Party MP in Bethnal Green & Bow and in Bradford West, defeating a Labour candidate on both occasions.

In 2013 Mr Galloway walked out of a debate at Oxford University after discovering his opponent was Israeli, saying “I don’t debate with Israelis”.

Two years later he interviewed Israeli antisemite Gilad Atzmon on his Russia Today television show.