Anti-Brexit posters were ‘sexist and offensive’
ANTI- Brexit campaigners have been forced to apologise for an ‘offensive and sexist’ poster campaign attacking female Labour MPs.
The Our Future Our Choice group said it was ‘extremely sorry’ for a billboard featuring Labour frontbencher Preet Kaur Gill with masking tape across her mouth.
The slogan from OFOC, which is demanding a referendum on the final Brexit deal, says: ‘Who silenced PreetKGill MP?’ It adds: ‘Back the young, back a People’s Vote on a final Brexit deal.’
The poster was attempting to show that the Shadow International Development Minister had been cowed into silence by Labour Party chiefs.
Last month, she appeared to defy Jeremy Corbyn by agreeing that a fresh referendum on the final Brexit deal was ‘an absolute must’.
But she later deleted the message and sought to ‘clarify’ her position by saying she backed a ‘meaningful vote on the (Brexit) deal by Parliament’ – leading some to claim she had been ‘silenced’.
Last night, the OFOC poster was condemned by MPs, who branded it ‘offensive and sexist’.
Warrington MP Helen Jones said: ‘Whatever your views on Brexit, this poster is entirely unacceptable. It makes it look as though she has been kidnapped by a violent criminal.
‘There are too many attempts to silence women in politics and a picture of a woman with her mouth taped up is highly offensive.’
Ms Gill, the MP for Edgbaston, herself branded the campaign ‘misogynistic and threatening’, claiming it only served to ‘increase hatred’ in the wake of MP Jo Cox’s murder in 2016.
She told The Mail on Sunday: ‘As the shocking murder of our colleague Jo Cox so tragically illustrated, MPs are already a target for extremists, and campaigns such as this only increase the risks we all face.’ Will Dry, the co-president of OFOC, which was set up by young, mainly Labour anti-Brexit activists, has emailed a grovelling apology to Ms Gill and told her the billboards were being taken down. ‘We are extremely sorry about our billboard,’ he added. ‘We misjudged everything about it.’
Other women Labour MPs targeted by OFOC include Shadow Ministers Diane Abbott and Nia Griffith. Ms Griffith is shown in the breast pocket of Nigel Farage, with the slogan: ‘Nia, don’t let him get his way’, while the advert taunting Ms Abbott says: ‘ Diane Abbott: Brexit too big to ignore…..back a People’s Vote.’
Last night, an OFOC spokesman said the billboards had been taken down: ‘We apologised to Preet Gill and reiterate that apology here.’