John McDonnell supported the IRA's use of ‘the ballot, the bullet and the bomb’

According to a story in The Times in 2015 John McDonnell, who will be Chancellor of the Exchequer (Minister of Finance) if the Labour Party come to power in England, told a public meeting at a pub in South London in 1985, attended by Sinn Fein and left-wing Labour Party members, that ‘the ballot, the bullet and the bomb’ would end British rule in Northern Ireland. He then called local Labour councillors who had boycotted the meeting ‘gutless wimps’ and said ‘a kneecapping might help change their minds’. A kneecapping means having their kneecaps shot off.

It was a joke, perhaps.


McDonnell has called often for what he calls 'direct action' against the Conservative government. He called last summer for a million people “to get out on the streets” to bring down the government.

He said “direct action” was a democratic form of voicing anger and demanding change but added that he was not calling for violence because 'violence achieves nothing.'