MP quits ‘anti-Semitic’ Labour after 55 years
LABOUR’S anti-Semitism crisis deepened last night after a Jewish MP quit the party – saying she could not tell her constituents to vote for Jeremy Corbyn.
Liverpool Riverside MP Louise Ellman, 73, said she had taken the ‘agonising’ decision to resign from the party after 55 years.
In a damning letter to her local party, she said Mr Corbyn had allowed anti-Jewish hatred to ‘flourish’, adding that Labour was no longer a safe place for Jews.
Dame Louise said last night: ‘I can no longer advocate voting Labour when it risks Corbyn becoming PM. I believe Jeremy Corbyn is not fit to serve as our prime minister.’
The MP has faced repeated calls to quit from Left-wing Corbyn supporters. She follows Luciana Berger, another Jewish MP in Liverpool, who left the party in February over its failure to tackle anti-Semitism. Labour MP Ian Austin, who was brought up by Holocaust survivors, also quit that month – as did Joan Ryan, chairman of Labour Friends of Israel.
Fellow Jewish MP Margaret Hodge said on Twitter last night that she was ‘absolutely devastated’ that Dame Louise ‘feels that she no longer has a place in the Labour Party’.
She added: ‘Louise has given decades of her life to public service and having known her for nearly 40 years, I am proud to call her a close friend. This is a huge loss to the Labour Party.’
Labour MP Stella Creasy added: ‘I’m gutted, absolutely gutted. It is heartbreaking for me. Many of us have been saying we have got a problem [with anti-Semitism]. We have to deal with it.
Labour is facing an inquiry by the Equality and Human Rights Commission to decide whether it is institutionally anti-Semitic.
A Labour Party spokesman said last night: ‘Jeremy Corbyn thanks Louise Ellman for her service to the Labour Party over many years. Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party are fully committed to the support, defence and celebration of the Jewish community.’