While Mr Corbyn now seems hell-bent on holding up Brexit with his “surrender bill”, a few years ago he was seen as a beacon of hope for Eurosceptics. The Labour veteran was the underdog in the party’s 2015 leadership election, a backbencher who most have thought had no hope. He ended up scoring a landslide win with 59.5 percent of the vote, thrashing runner-up Andy Burnham on 19 percent, who had previously been the frontrunner.

According to the 2016 book ‘The Bad Boys of Brexit’ by Leave.EU founder Arron Banks, there were some among Brexiteers who hoped this would happen.

Jim Mellon, a friend and business partner of Mr Banks’ whose funds helped kick start their campaign, was sure it would happen.

Mr Banks wrote for his August 28, 2015, book entry: “Jim Mellon reckons Jeremy Corbyn will be Labour leader when the referendum takes place.

“I hope he’s right. Everyone knows Corbyn’s a Eurosceptic.”

Mr Corbyn’s latest antics – proposing a Bill that would force Boris Johnson to request a Brexit extension from the EU – may seem to contradict this statement.

However, the Labour leader does indeed have a clear history of Euroscepticism dating back to the Seventies. 

After the UK joined the EEC – the precursor the the EU – in 1973, there was a referendum on whether to leave or not in 1975.

The British public overall voted to Remain 67-33 percent, but Mr Corbyn went against the grain to oppose membership while serving as a local councillor in the London borough of Haringey.

He later opposed further European integration proposed in the Maastricht Treaty, which created the EU as we know it.

In a 1993 Commons debate, he said: “The Maastricht Treaty does not take us in the direction of checks and balances contained in the American federal constitution. 

“It takes us in the opposite direction of an unelected legislative body – the [European] Commission – and, in the case of foreign policy, a policy Commission that will be, in effect, imposing foreign policy on nation states that have fought for their own democratic accountability.”

He also argued that a left-wing Government would not want to be part of a body like the EU.

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He said: “The whole basis of the Maastricht Treaty is the establishment of the European Central Bank which is staffed by bankers, independent of national governments and national economic policies, and whose sole policy is the maintenance of price stability. 

“This will undermine any social objective that any Labour Government in the United Kingdom – or any other Government – would wish to carry out.” 

Mr Corbyn voted against ratifying the Treaty, but was outnumbered in the Commons and the Bill was passed.

Not backing down, at the 1996 Labour Party Conference, Mr Corbyn described the EU as “totally unaccountable to anyone”.

In 1997, he was placed on a Eurosceptic ‘white list’ along with 25 other Labour MPs. 

The list was drawn up by Anglo-French financier Sir James Michael Goldsmith, who in 1994 created the Referendum Party advocating for a public vote on EU membership.

According to The Guardian on April 17, 1997, Mr Corbyn was mentioned along with the other “usual suspects” from the Labour left like Dennis Skinner, Tony Benn and Bernie Grant.

In 2008, Mr Corbyn opposed the Lisbon Treaty, which established further European integration.

In 2011, he backed a proposed Brexit referendum.

In 2015, he accused the EU of acting “brutally” towards the Greeks during their financial crisis” and appointed known Eurosceptic Seumas Milne as a top Labour adviser.

During the 2016 EU referendum, the Labour Party officially backed Remain but Mr Corbyn was accused of running a rather lukewarm and ineffective campaign.

One of his own MPs Phil Wilson accused him of “sabotaging” the campaign with his “wilfully abysmal performance”.

After Leave came out on top, Mr Corbyn insisted that Article 50 should be triggered immediately.

He said in a BBC interview: “The British people have made their decision.”

And yet, this week Mr Corbyn has let down Brexiteers who have supported him all this time.

He said himself that the public have made their decision, yet set in motion a Bill to kick the can down the road and prevent the UK leaving on October 31.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson branded the Labour leader “cowardly” in an angry Commons face-off.

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