Corbyn’s aide sang with IRA thug who led bar massacre
JEREMY Corbyn’s newest recruit has been filmed singing with an IRA terrorist who led a bar-room massacre.
Jayne Fisher, who will become the Labour Party’s ‘stakeholder manager’ in the New Year, has until recently been employed as the head of Sinn Fein’s operation in London.
Her appointment by Mr Corbyn caused anger among Labour moderates. And concerns deepened when footage emerged of her singing with IRA terrorist Brendan ‘Bik’ McFarlane.
He was sentenced to life in prison for leading the 1975 Bayardo Bar attack in the Protestant Shankill Road district of Belfast. Five people were killed and 60 injured after his gang fired into the crowded bar before blowing it up and then shooting at bystanders.
While being held in the Maze prison, McFarlane made a failed attempt to escape dressed as a priest before breaking free in 1983 during a mass break-out involving 38 republicans.
He was recaptured in 1986 before being released on parole in 1997.
McFarlane, a former trainee priest, is now described by Sinn Fein as a voluntary worker. He is a regular singer in a Belfast bar and performed with Miss Fisher in 2009. She also publicised conferences in 2011 with the convicted terrorist. In
Anger as Gerry Adams’ right-hand woman is appointed Corbyn aide From yesterday’s Mail
2014, Miss Fisher was also pictured next to Sinn Fein’s Conor Murphy, who was sentenced to five years’ prison for possession of explosives in 1982.
Two years earlier, in 2012, she was pictured with another Sinn Fein politician Jennifer McCann, who served ten years for shooting an RUC officer.
Miss Fisher once described the 1981 Maze hunger strike, in which ten republicans died, as ‘one of the most important and courageous struggles to have taken place anywhere in history, anywhere in the world’.
Opposition politicians raised concerns about Mr Corbyn’s decision to hire Miss Fisher. Ulster Unionist MP Tom Elliott said: ‘It causes great concern when such people get security clearance. It is disappointing that Jeremy Corbyn has employed someone with that background.’
Lord Tebbit, who nearly lost his life in the Brighton bomb and whose wife became wheelchair bound because of the atrocity, said: ‘Many of the Labour lords I have spoken to are horrified by this appointment but it’s par for the course for Corbyn.’ Former Labour MP Tom Harris said: ‘By appointing ex-Sinn Fein staffer Jayne Fisher to the leader’s office, Labour has shot itself in the kneecap.’ Tory MP Jack Lopresti last night wrote to Mr Corbyn asking him to rethink the appointment of Miss Fisher, who he said had shown ‘a callous disregard for the pain and suffering’ of the victims of IRA attacks.
Miss Fisher was also photographed with Mr Corbyn and Sinn Fein politicians Martin McGuinness and Gerry Adams in the Houses of Parliament last year.
Labour insiders said she had been ‘helping’ Mr Corbyn informally for months but was now becoming an official staff member.
Yet the register of MPs’ staff, which was updated on November 8, lists her as working for Sinn Fein MP Paul Maskey.
Mr Corbyn’s office did not comment on the revelations.