Anti-Muslim, anti-black, pro-Zionist: UK Labour goes for purge

I attended Faiza Shaheen’s impressive candidate launch in Chingford four years ago. She aimed to take on IDS and she dented his majority. Reselected two years ago by the local Labour Party, four days ago she was deselected by a 3-person kangaroo court from the party’s National Executive Committee.

Update: Faiza Shaheen to stand as an independent in Chingford.

Dr Faiza Shaheen is an economist specialising in inequality. She teaches the Masters course in inequality at the London School of Economics. Not a bad background for a Labour parliamentary candidate one might think. I’d have selected her here if she had come up when I had the job.

She was deselected by three members of the National Executive Committee of the UK Labour party on the basis of ten tweets she had made, stretching back ten years, some from before she was in the Labour party. The research involved in that tells you all you need to know about why this was a kangaroo court.

Rishi Sunak’s unexpected call for a snap election has upset selection timescales, and has also handed more power to the central committee to make selections bypassing local input. Two of the three people who dumped Faiza Shaheen have now been given safe seats.

At the time of writing Faiza Shaheen intends to take legal action. Shades of Richard Prebble!

Also last week the spotlight was on the UK’s first black MP, Diane Abbott. Last year she had been investigated by the party on the basis of one tweet, for which she had promptly apologised, but had had the Labour whip withdrawn by Labour leader Keir Starmer. As late as last Thursday, Starmer was insisting that the so-called independent process was still under way, until it was leaked to The Times that it had in fact concluded in February. Cue swift reinstatement of the whip, and talk of a dignified exit for Diane.

A day or so later that blew apart too, when it was leaked that she would not be allowed to stand for Labour. Again Starmer resorted to the ‘nothing to do with me’ ploy. That didn’t work either, and he had to personally announce that Diane will be allowed to stand for Labour again.

Starmer’s real problem is not only that Faiza Shaheen is Muslim and Diane Abbott is black, but that both are on the left of the Party. Abbott is a close associate of Jeremy Corbyn, and Faiza Shaheen opposes inequality.

On the right of the Party, Luke Akehurst is another recently-appointed and well-known candidate He is a long-term opponent of Jeremy Corbyn, a Hackney councillor and NEC member who has just been parachuted into a safe seat in Durham. He is also a director of We Believe in Israel, which states that “he is not Jewish but has been a committed Zionist all his life.” We Believe in Israel is currently urging its members and supporters to write to their MPs urging them to stand in solidarity with Israel. Akehurst is is now busily deleting his tweets, except that he has found there are too many to get rid of completely.

Owen Jones summarises the issues “Power-drunk and arrogant: if this is how Starmer’s Labour treats its MPs, what will his party be like in power?” Some quotes:

Starmer’s own dishonesty is a matter of public record. As well as championing radical domestic policies in his leadership campaign, he promised Labour would be a “broad church”, demanding parliamentary selections be “more democratic” and that “we should end NEC impositions of candidates”.

These purges tell us that Labour’s political cupboard is empty. They have no meaningful ideas other than factional warfare. If this is all they know, there is a strong chance their administration will be defined by continuity with what came before: continuous factional infighting.

The purges also tell us that hubris does not compensate for reality. There is no enthusiasm for Starmer and his project. As the veteran pollster Peter Kellner notes, no leader of the opposition has ever won with such poor ratings.

After this week, the mask is off. Labour’s leaders are sending a clear signal that once they have secured No 10, they will behave with the same power-drunk arrogance and the same disregard for democratic norms that they are showing now towards their own MPs. Starmer should consider, for a moment, the cautionary tale of Boris Johnson – another leader who purged his parliamentary party. Yes, he scooped an 80-seat majority. But then, in less than three years, he was driven from office in disgrace, and the Tory party was left in tatters.

And people wonder why the mainstream parties are losing ground. The turnout figures for the election will make interesting reading I think.