Exit of antisemitic members has left party ‘30% ahead in the polls’, Labour MP told
Streatham MP Belle Ribeiro-Addy is criticised by comedian Matt Forde after she claimed Keir Starmer had created 'hostile' environment for members expelled from or who quit Labour
Lee Harpin is the Jewish News's political editor
A Labour MP who accused Keir Starmer of turning the party into a “hostile” environment for ex-members who either quit or were expelled from the party has been told to recognise the “clear correlation” between their departure and being “30 percent ahead in the opinion polls.”
Belle Ribeiro-Addy, the MP for Streatham, appeared on the BBC2 Politics Live show, where she was asked to defend comments she made at a rally organised by the Socialist Campaign Group at which she said of the Labour leadership “they are trying to make it as hostile as possible so you leave.”
She told Thursday’s edition of the political show that “a lot of people” had left Labour to show their “dissatisfaction” with its direction and that it was “wrong” a “certain section of the party” felt they had to leave.
The MP added she believed “some elements of the party” wanted to see the exodus.
Matt Forde, a comedian and leading podcaster, who has done the Spitting Image voices for Donald Trump and Boris Johnson, responded by saying: “Two hundred thousand members may have left but the Labour Party is now 30% ahead in the polls.
“There’s a clear correlation between how the country feels about the party and how elements of the Labour Party, who frankly should never have been allowed in feel about itself.
“The Labour Party is a mainstream patriotic party, and frankly Clement Attlee and Nye Bevan would turn in their graves when they saw what Jeremy Corbyn and his clique did to the party.”
Forde continued: “And the way they treated Jewish people was a disgrace, so I’m glad those people have left because finally the country has a chance to vote for a party that isn’t getting investigated by the EHRC, isn’t spreading hatred against minorities this country.”
As Forde, who quit Labour under Corbyn and is yet to rejoin, began to praise Starmer’s leadership, Ribeiro-Addy claimed: “It isn’t fair to say that.”
He replied: “What, it isn’t fair to say the party was being investigated by the EHRC?”
The MP said it was not fair to say everyone had left “for that reason.”
Ribeiro-Addy then claimed Labour should be a “broad church” and that other members felt “discriminated against” as well.
She added: “Obviously there is no place for discrimination against anybody in the party” and added Labour should “include all types of people in this country of varying political opinions.”
Laughing, Forde said: “You can’t include every political opinion.”
The MP responded “obviously not the Conservatives.”
She added: “We all believe in the same thing, we believe in equality and diversity.”
But Forde said: “I don’t think we do believe in the same thing.
“The radical hard left share an authoritarian streak that is not shared by the mainstream.”
Recent opinion polls have given Labour as high as a 33% lead over the Liz Truss-led Conservatives in the polls.
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