… on a quiet day, I can hear her breathing

Category: Diane Abbott

  • Diane Abbott ‘has Labour whip restored but banned from election run’

    Spread the love

    https://www.thenational.scot/news/24351541.diane-abbott-has-labour-whip-restored-banned-election-run

    DIANE Abbott has had the Labour whip restored less than one day after Keir Starmer’s claims that an internal party probe into her was still “ongoing” were revealed to be untrue.

    However, she is still to be banned from standing for the party at the next General Election, according to reports.

    The PA news agency said that Abbott was given the Labour whip back following an internal investigation into comments she made suggesting that white minorities do not experience “racism” in the same way as others.

    As Starmer used comments aimed at Abbott from Tory donor Frank Hester to attack his Conservative opponents in March, he also claimed she could not be given back the Labour whip because that internal probe into her was still ongoing.

    However, the BBC reported on Monday night that the investigation had actually concluded in December, 2023.

    …

    https://www.thenational.scot/news/24351541.diane-abbott-has-labour-whip-restored-banned-election-run

  • Starmer lies on Abbott exposed

    Spread the love

    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/starmer-lies-abbott-exposed

    Image of Dianne Abbott
    Dianne Abbott MP

    SIR KEIR STARMER has been concealing the truth over Diane Abbott’s exclusion from Labour in Parliament, it was revealed today.

    BBC Newsnight reported that the party probe into Ms Abbott’s offence — a brief newspaper letter for which she immediately apologised — finished last December.

    She has since remained without the Labour whip entirely at the discretion of chief whip Alan Campbell, who is appointed by and answers to the Labour leader.

    Yet Sir Keir has repeatedly claimed that the decision on Ms Abbott’s future — she cannot stand in the general election for Labour without the matter being resolved — was nothing to do with him.

    This has now been exposed as a falsehood. The fact that Britain’s first black woman MP has remained suspended to the point where her career may be terminated has been a decision of the Labour leadership.

    Ms Abbott has long ridiculed Sir Keir’s hands-off pretence, tweeting last week that the situation was “everything to do with him.”

    …

    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/starmer-lies-abbott-exposed

  • ‘Let me stand,’ Diane Abbott tells Sir Keir

    Spread the love

    https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/let-me-stand-diane-abbott-tells-sir-keir

    Corbyn to carry the radical spirit of his tenure as Labour leader by fighting for his Islington North seat as an independent

    BRITAIN’S first black female MP told Sir Keir Starmer today to give her the right to stand for Labour in the general election.

    Diane Abbott told the Morning Star that she wanted to continue as Labour MP for the Hackney North constituency she has represented since 1987.

    Ms Abbott said: “I apologised promptly for the letter to the Observer which caused all the fuss. But 13 months later Keir Starmer still cannot come to a decision about whether he thinks that I should be allowed to rejoin the Parliamentary Labour Party.

    “Yet it only took him weeks to decide that life-long Tory Natalie Elphicke could join. I was reselected unanimously over a year ago and my constituents want to know what is happening.”

    Ms Abbott has been suspended from Labour’s parliamentary party for over a year while the party purportedly investigates a short newspaper letter deemed offensive and for which she immediately apologised.

    Her treatment contrasts with the indulgence shown to right-wing, and male and white, MPs who have done the same or worse and got off with a slap on the wrists.

    …

    Article continues at https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/let-me-stand-diane-abbott-tells-sir-keir

  • Leeds Pride ends sponsorship deal with Frank Hester’s company over alleged racist comments

    Spread the love

    https://leftfootforward.org/2024/04/leeds-pride-ends-sponsorship-deal-with-frank-hesters-company-over-alleged-racist-comments/

    ‘Through this decision, Leeds Pride asserts its position as an advocate for inclusivity, striving to ensure that Pride celebrations remain a platform for equality.’

    Leeds Pride has terminated its sponsorship partnership with Leeds-based software company Phoenix Partnership (TPP), following the row over alleged racist comments the organisation’s founder and CEO Frank Hester said about Diane Abbott.

    Organisers of Leeds Pride, which is due to take place on July 21, in celebration of LGBTQ+ culture, said they were ‘discontinuing’ the partnership, saying it was now ‘imperative it reassesses its association’ with Hester.

    In a statement on social media, Leeds Pride said: “In light of recent developments involving alleged racist comments made by the TPP’s chief executive, it became imperative for Leeds Pride to reassess its association with the company. The decision to terminate the sponsorship agreement underscores the organisation’s dedication to upholding the values of diversity within the LGBTQ+ community and beyond.

    “Leeds Pride acknowledges the concerns voiced by members of the community and recognises the importance of taking steps to uphold its principles. Through this decision, Leeds Pride asserts its position as an advocate for inclusivity, striving to ensure that Pride celebrations remain a platform for equality.”

    …

    Controversy consumed the businessman after the Guardian reported that Hester had allegedly made racist comments about MP Diane Abbott. The newspaper claimed he had said: “It’s like trying not to be racist but you see Diane Abbott on the TV, and you’re just like… you just want to hate all black women because she’s there.

    “And I don’t hate all black women at all, but I think she should be shot.”

    …

    https://leftfootforward.org/2024/04/leeds-pride-ends-sponsorship-deal-with-frank-hesters-company-over-alleged-racist-comments/

  • Journalist Owen Jones leaves Keir Starmer’s genocide-supporting ‘Labour’ party

    Spread the love

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/mar/21/labour-party-cancelling-membership-policies

    …

    The assault on Gaza, the great crime of our age, adds moral indecency to the pile of dishonesty and vacuity. When Starmer declared Israel had the right to cut off energy and water to Palestinian civilians, he did so as a human rights lawyer who understands the Geneva conventions. After letting shadow cabinet ministers defend him, he claimed it “has never been my view that Israel had the right to cut off water, food, fuel or medicines”. We all have political red lines: mine is supporting what would amount to war crimes against innocent civilians, toddlers and newborn babies among them, then gaslighting the public over doing so.

    Where is my gratitude for Starmer delivering a now inevitable landslide victory, you may ask? Well, he didn’t force Boris Johnson and his cronies to violate their own pandemic rules, or to trash the NHS, or oversee the worst squeeze in living standards in history. Nor did he propel to power Liz Truss, whose unhinged economic experiment crashed the economy – the moment when the electorate turned on this Tory party for good.

    The absolute power a landslide victory will give Labour should scare you. When Starmer allies deployed antisemitic tropes – with one joking about a “run on silver shekels” when two Jewish businessmen missed out on peerages, and another calling a Jewish Tory donor a “puppet master” – an apology was deemed to be sufficient. When another racially abused a journalist and had a sexual harassment complaint upheld, they were reinstated after investigation.

    Contrast this with Diane Abbott, Britain’s first Black female MP, who was suspended after immediately apologising for an Observer letter in which she argued that Irish, Jewish and Traveller people are not subject to racism “all their lives”. She has been left in limbo for 10 months and counting while the party investigates – only for Labour to use the racist abuse directed at her by a Tory donor for political capital, while still refusing to reinstate her.

    …