Labour has now suspended Graham Jones as a parliamentary candidate after a recording emerged of him allegedly saying that Britons who travel to Israel to fight for the IDF should be ‘locked up’. The former MP, who is standing again in Hyndburn, was taped appearing to refer to ‘f***ing Israel’, and saying it was ‘illegal’ for Britons to fight for Israel. It isn’t – the UK recognises the right of dual nationals to join ‘legitimately recognised armed forces’, but it is a point that has been debated within politics, and suggests that Keir Starmer is lowering the bar following the fallout from his Rochdale decision.
Starmer has made a real mess of the Rochdale situation. Today he argued that suspending Labour’s candidate Azhar Ali was evidence of him acting ‘decisively’, saying:
Certain information came to light over the weekend in relation to the candidate. There was a fulsome apology. Further information came to light yesterday, calling for decisive action. So I took decisive action. It is a huge thing to withdraw support for a Labour candidate during the course of a by-election. It’s a thought decision, a necessary decision.
But when I say the Labour party has changed under my leadership, I mean it. It has changed.
He then had to answer questions on whether he would investigate the other councillors who were part of the discussion with Ali about Israel and 7 October. Starmer replied that any allegation would be investigated, but it shows how deep the problem is for the Labour leader because he now has to decide how low the bar is going to be and how ruthless he wants to be with the wider Labour party in a way he hasn’t been up to this point. No-one is very happy with the way this has panned out for Starmer. His claim that this was ‘decisive’ action is not convincing, given it took him longer than 24 hours to take that action. It just highlights how slow he was. Now, he seems to be revving up the party machine to act fast in response to what could be a number of attacks from the Conservatives, who are keen to prove that Labour hasn’t changed in the way he keeps boasting.
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