Corbyn crisis: Second Labour veteran may go

Tackle anti-Semitism or I quit, says MP (as others agonise too)

A SENIOR Labour MP last night threatened to follow Frank Field out of the party unless Jeremy Corbyn tackles the antiSemitism crisis.

Mike Gapes said he could quit as early as next week unless Labour’s ruling body finally adopts the international definition of anti-Semitism – a move Mr Corbyn has resisted.

The MP for Ilford South since 1992 added he was ‘agonising’ about his future in the party after a summer in which Labour has been engulfed by toxic allegations about anti-Semitism, including several relating directly to Mr Corbyn.

Mr Gapes suggested his future rested on a decision by Labour’s national executive committee next week on whether to adopt the internationally recognised definition of anti-Semitism in full. He warned he would not accept any ‘weasel worded caveat’ in the definition.

‘I am agonising every day about the sit- uation and the state of the Labour Party,’ he said. ‘I will make my decision about how I deal with this in my own time.’

Mr Field, an MP for almost 40 years, announced on Thursday that he was resigning the Labour whip at Westminster to sit as an independent.

In an angry resignation letter, he accused Mr Corbyn of turning Labour into a ‘force for anti-Semitism in British politics’ and failing to stamp out a culture of bullying by the hard Left.

Labour’s chief whip Nick Brown told Mr Field last night he would be expelled from the party in a fortnight unless he backed down, but the MP vowed to fight this.

A Labour source said he had been expelled with immediate effect, adding: ‘If you resign the whip you cannot be a member of the party – it’s automatic.’

Other Labour moderates were tight-lipped about their intentions in the wake of Mr Field’s dramatic departure but one MP told the Mail several colleagues were considering whether to quit.

‘There are quite a few of us in the same position as Mike – agonising about what to do,’ he said.

‘It’s a big decision – people have given their lives to the Labour Party – but at the same time we can’t just stand by and let things carry on as they are. The stench is unbearable.’ Labour MP John Mann warned that others would follow Mr Field’s lead unless Mr Corbyn finally agreed to get tough on anti-Semitism.

‘It’s a distinct possibility others will go unless the racism, the bullying, the intimidation of the extremists is stopped,’ he said.

Mr Mann called on Mr Corbyn to guarantee all Jewish MPs would be automatically reselected for their seats to prevent the toxic deselection attempts being launched against figures such as Luciana Berger and Margaret Hodge.

Neil Coyle, another Labour moderate, said the party had to deal with the culture of ‘bullying and abuse’ identified by Mr Field.

Mr Field said yesterday he plans to spend the ‘next few days’ deciding whether to stand down as an MP to trigger a by-election in his Birkenhead constituency in which he would stand as an independent.

Chris Williamson, a leading ally of Mr Corbyn, said Mr Field’s attacks on the Labour leader were ‘grotesque slurs which have no basis in reality’.

APPEARING on breakfast TV yesterday, Frank Field was everything his Birkenhead constituents and politicians from all sides have come to admire over nearly four decades in the House: passionate, thoughtful and principled.

In resigning over anti-Semitism, he nevertheless insisted he wanted to stand as a Labour MP at the next election – but only if the party leadership ‘puts its house in order’.

From the way Jeremy Corbyn responded, there is little hope of that. Instead of acting to assuage Mr Field’s concerns – and those of countless other MPs within the party – the Labour leader and his allies bunkered down and sent their hard-Left allies on the attack.

So out came Corbynite lickspittle Owen Jones to claim Mr Field was quitting only because he feared deselection by local activists. Out came sinister Derby North MP Chris Williamson to claim Labour had taken the issue of anti-Semitism very seriously and to suggest otherwise was ‘a grotesque slur’. Who are they trying to kid?

In truth, Mr Corbyn has done next to nothing about this virus infecting his party, while every day the drip, drip of damaging revelations about his personal links to antiSemites continues.

Yesterday it emerged that, only a year before he became Labour leader, Mr Corbyn met leading figures from Deir Yassin Remembered, a group run by Holocaust denier and notorious anti-Semite Paul Eisen. Who, now, could argue with former Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, who accused Mr Corbyn of supporting ‘racists, terrorists and dealers of hate’?

For the Mail, Mr Field’s decision is principled and courageous.

Amid swirling rumours about further resignations, the only question appears to be how many other Labour MPs will take the same honourable step.