Labour: The racist party
Its own top MP says it meets definition of institutional racism over anti-Semitism
LABOUR is ‘institutionally racist’, a former frontbencher has warned in an extraordinary attack on his own party.
Chuka Umunna, who once stood as a leadership candidate, said the party met the full definition of the term as set out in a police inquiry.
Last week, the MP for Streatham called on leader Jeremy Corbyn to ‘call off the dogs’ following votes of no confidence in moderate Labour MPs.
Speaking yesterday, he said: ‘If you look at the definition of institutional racism as outlined by Sir William Macpherson in the Macpherson Report – and the Macpherson Inquiry produced the institutional racism definition – it’s beyond doubt for me that [The Labour Party] has met it. It’s very painful for me to say that.
He told Sky News’s Sophy Ridge On Sunday show: ‘Part of the reason I joined the Labour Party, my party, my family started supporting the party, was because it was an anti-racist party and I think the failure to deal with the racism that is anti-Semitism is particular and clearly is a problem.’
Sir William’s definition of institutional racism was central to his 1999 report about the police investigation into the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence.
Sir William defined ‘institutional racism’ as: ‘The collective failure of an organisation to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their colour, culture, or ethnic origin.
‘It can be seen or detected in processes, attitudes and behaviour which amount to discrimination through unwitting prejudice, ignorance, thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping which disadvantage minority ethnic people.’
Despite the charge, Mr Umunna vowed to stay as a Labour member because he felt it was better to ‘try and argue and see change through in an organisation’ rather than ‘leave the field’.
His remarks came as Labour Friends of Israel chairman Joan Ryan, a former minister under Tony Blair, and Luton South MP Gavin Shuker, both lost local no confidence votes on Thursday.
Chris Leslie became the latest MP to face a no confidence vote among local ward members, and will now face a constituency-wide vote. The Nottingham East MP said his party had been infiltrated by the ‘intolerant hard-Left’, and the move had been ‘orchestrated nationally’.
Yesterday, Mr Shuker warned that his colleagues were at ‘breaking point’ and the party could become a ‘personality cult’.
He said Labour was in danger of becoming an ‘increasingly narrow Leftist sect’ and that the targeting of centre-Left MPs was a national issue. ‘They see the moves against them locally – which, by the way, the leadership could step in and do something about and choose not to,’ he told BBC Radio 4.
Labour has battled to contain the fallout from the anti-Semitism crisis that has engulfed the party over the summer.
It follows the wreath-laying controversy in which Mr Corbyn was forced to defend his presence at a ceremony at a graveyard in Tunisia where terrorists were buried.
The leadership also faced fury over its initial refusal to adopt the widely accepted full definition of anti-Semitism, as set out by the International Holocaust Remembrance Association.
It has since agreed to adopt the definition and all relevant examples in a bid to stem criticism.
Labour Party chairman Ian Lavery told Sky Mr Umunna’s call was ‘disrespectful’ and ‘offensive’.
He said: ‘Calling anybody a dog is absolutely outrageous in the extreme, and Chuka Umunna of all people should know that.’
Urging Mr Umunna to start ‘apologising to those people who he’s offended immensely’, Mr Lavery added: ‘These are the people who keep Chuka Umunna and myself and other MPs in a job.’
Mr Umunna defended his remark, saying: ‘The phrase I used is a metaphor, a figure of speech.’
Shadow chancellor John McDonnell claimed Mr Umunna was ‘inventing stories’ and called on him to back his party. But Edinburgh South Labour MP Ian Murray said that ‘attacks on those who speak out against antiSemitism cannot continue’.
He added: ‘There are clearly many individuals who have been deeply hurt by elements of racism within the Labour Party.
‘The party leadership must work harder to demonstrate a zero tolerance approach towards this.’
It comes after former chairman of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, Trevor Phillips, claimed the Labour Party is ‘led by anti-Semites and racists’.
Mr Phillips told The Mail on Sunday that rows about antiSemitism are ‘killing our party’.
Mr Corbyn’s office called Mr Phillips’s comments ‘wrong and offensive’.
Last night, Mr Corbyn vowed to tackle the ‘social cancer’ of antiSemitism in the party as he acknowledged it was a ‘difficult time’ for Britain’s Jewish community. He said: ‘The Labour Party stands in solidarity with the Jewish community in the fight against anti-Semitism.’
‘Failure to deal with racism’
MEANWHILE, it is now ‘beyond doubt’ that Labour is ‘institutionally racist’.
No, not the words of this newspaper, or the Tories, or outraged representatives of the Jewish community.
This is the devastating judgment of Chuka Umunna, one of Labour’s leading lights and a walking advertisement for the success of multi-racial Britain.
The son of a Nigerian immigrant father and Anglo-Irish mother, Mr Umunna joined the party largely because of its commitment to racial equality.
So for him now to brand it a haven for bigots and anti-Semites is a truly shocking indictment of Jeremy Corbyn and his Marxist acolytes.
And it drags Labour’s reputation even further into the gutter. For if someone with Mr Umunna’s background doesn’t trust his party to protect the rights of minorities, who on Earth would?
Certainly not former racial equalities chief Trevor Phillips. Yesterday he threw his own grenade into the debate, saying racism was ‘killing the party’ and strongly implying that Mr Corbyn himself was anti-Semitic.
The official Labour reaction was depressingly predictable – ‘Jeremy and the leadership are life-long anti-racists, who are determined to tackle anti-Semitism.’
No-one believes this any more, just as noone believes Mr Corbyn wants ‘kinder, gentler politics’. Under his leadership, this once great party has become mired in a swamp of bigotry, bullying and intolerance.
So the big question remains: How hard are Mr Umunna and other moderate Labour MPs prepared to fight to save the party they profess to love so much?
WE already knew that university vice-chancellors were pocketing unconscionably vast salaries, but the Mail’s revelation that even managers of student halls of residence can earn over £1million a year is truly obscene. What an insult to students who leave university with colossal debts for degrees which often bring them little or no benefit in the world of work.