Jeremy Corbyn tells ITV News: Labour MPs will have to back me if I win

Video report by ITV News Deputy Political Editor Chris Ship

Jeremy Corbyn has told ITV News that Labour MPs will have to back him if he becomes the party's new leader.

ITV News has found only half of the 35 MPs who nominated Corbyn for the leadership have voted for him.

Asked by ITV News' Chris Ship if he was worried that many in his party "want anyone else to be leader of the party but you", the Islington MP said: "MPs are important but they are not the entirety of the Labour Party".

Corbyn - who has gone from rank outsider to the frontrunner in the contest warned fellow MPs that they are '"very well aware of the huge political movement out there" and there would have to be a "coming together" of the party.

He insisted he was "very confident" that the party would come together to present a "very strong opposition to what the government is doing".

Under his leadership, he said, Labour would "put across a serious radical alternative message".

Corbyn - who is up against Yvette Cooper, Andy Burnham and Liz Kendall - was speaking as voting closed, with the result set to be announced on Saturday.

Earlier, the party's former policy chief Jon Cruddas - who helped Corbyn onto the ballot - warned the party faced "collapse" if the veteran left-wing MP won.

Asked about Cruddas' comments, Corbyn said: "It was his choice of words not mine".

Corbyn also took a swipe at Prime Minister David Cameron, saying he would not have authorised the airstrike on British national, turned IS fighter, Reyaad Khan and "the PM has some very difficult questions to answer about the legality of what he did".

He said: "I'm unclear as to the point of killing the individual by this drone attack."