“This is a time we need an opposition to be unequivocally clear in their support for human rights and the underlying principles of equality. But instead, we see a failed response from UK Labour rooted in its own antisemitism crisis.”
*This article was written before the publication of the Forde Report
It is no coincidence the Equality and Human Rights Act 2010 was the product of a Labour administration; people with protected characteristics don’t do well under Conservative governments. At no time has this been more starkly true than in the last 12 years: Theresa May’s Hostile Environment; the Windrush scandal; the disproportionate impact of welfare changes and austerity on the lives of children, the sick, and the elderly; the rising rates of hate crimes, in particular against Muslims, Jews, people of colour, and LGBTQ+ communities. Lastly there is the overt misogyny and patriarchy – always a bellwether for the rise of the far right – which sits at the heart of Johnson’s administration.
So, this is a time we need an opposition to be unequivocally clear in their understanding of, and support for, human rights and the underlying principles of equality. But instead, we see a failed response to the crisis we are in.
This is in no small part due to crisis that hit the Labour Party itself between 2016-2019, in the form of dramatic increases in allegations of antisemitism within the party. The response to these allegations are undermining the party’s whole approach to equality and social justice.
Having spent much of my career addressing the ways racism, ableism and childism affect the health of children, I am committed to equality, human rights, and social justice as general principles.
So what is it about Labour’s approach to eradicating antisemitism that leaves me gravely troubled? It is primarily this: as far as I can gather from what data are publicly available, the population receiving notices of investigation (NOIs), suspended, or expelled from Labour since 2019 – most on the left, and most for allegations of antisemitism – includes disproportionately more Jews. This strongly suggests that their Jewish ethnicity could be a factor contributing to these investigations.
I am not Jewish, so am observing this from the outside, i.e., as a gentile. But as someone who has worked addressing issues of equality and diversity within a large institution, these figures seem problematic. It can only mean two things: either Jews are treated more harshly than gentiles, which would be antisemitic, or that Jews on the left are perceived differently to gentiles on the left, i.e., their behaviours are deemed more unacceptable. There are two possible reasons why they might be perceived differently: bias in the investigating officers – i.e., antisemitism at an individual level – or bias against left wing Jews in general – i.e., systemic antisemitism.
This is a mess; a mess with human consequences: cases are many, including for example those of Heather Mendick and Riva Joffe. Mendick, a Labour member and party activist for many years, has written a letter describing her distress and explaining why she sees her NOI as wrong.
The case of 81-year-old Riva Joffe is particularly sad. To quote Andrew Feinstein “In memory of Riva Joffe, whose parents fled the pogroms of Tsarist Russia, who grew up amidst the giants of the anti-apartheid struggle, a life-long antiracist who received a letter of suspension from the Labour Party a few weeks before she passed away.” Appalling, this lady died while under NOI after a life dedicated to fighting injustice and oppression.
The disproportionate number of cases of alleged antisemitism reflects the huge amount of resources Labour has committed in its apparent attempt to resolve its antisemitism crisis, which in any case seems to have magically disappeared overnight under Keir Starmer.
But in its actions, the Labour party is acting as if antisemitism is de facto a more important form of racism than any other, and a more important protected characteristic than any other; as such, the need to eradicate it from the Party has trumped all other equality and social justice requirements; as Riva Joffe’s case illustrates.
In effect this creates a hierarchy of racism and a hierarchy of equality. This is absurd. One cannot have a hierarchy of equality without negating the whole endeavour. Indeed, this is just what we see. At least three MPs in the last five years, whilst sitting as Labour members, have either written or distributed election material that was discriminatory against Gypsy/Roma/Traveler communities; one went on to join the shadow cabinet. Many black members are unhappy about the treatment of black MPs as evidenced in the ‘Labour leaks’, a situation worsened by the failure to publish the Forde report. Many Muslims have expressed concern about the re-entry into the party of Trevor Phillips after his Islamophobic remarks, saying this does not leave Labour a safe space for them. Disabled members reported inadequate planning regarding accessible spaces in the annual conference and disabled members under investigation report the party failed to make proper adjustments for their disabilities to enable them to take part in the investigating process. I was unhappy at the disdain that greeted Young Labour voices at the 2021 Labour conference; it made me doubt the party’s good faith in any respect claimed for the views of children, despite ostensible support for children’s rights.
This risks the efforts put into challenging any discrimination, including antisemitism, both inside the party and directed at society in general. This cannot be happening at a worse time, a time where we live under a government which disregards the rights of minorities, whose Justice Minister is openly hostile to the notion of human rights, and whose Home Secretary is prepared to ignore national and international law to engage in a human trade in asylum seekers with the government of Rwanda.
Ultimately all people with protected characteristics are in jeopardy, a fact illustrated all too well by the recent case of a non-verbal British-born black teenager, a British citizen, who escaped from his mental health in-patient facility only to be placed in a deportation centre by police after being found travelling on a train without a ticket. Add in the existential threat to disabled people through austerity and welfare cuts, to GRT communities from the Police and Crime Bill, the disparities in pandemic deaths between communities of colour and white communities, the high suicide rate of Trans individuals, the continuing targeting of black communities by the police, the huge racial disparities within the criminal justice system including in deaths in police custody, and finally the relentless tide of women dying from domestic abuse – we should be in no doubt there remains a battle to be fought for equality and social justice.
We know from history once the human rights of a few are trampled the rights of all of us are threatened. As a society we cannot afford the main opposition in Westminster to be failing us on this.
* Professor Elspeth Webb was Chair of the Equality and Human Rights Committee at Cardiff University School of Medicine & a Labour party member.
Cover image via Flickr
