UK Labour official quits after backing candidate who posted Holocaust hoax link
Disciplinary board head Christine Shawcroft had sought to overturn suspension of would-be councilor who shared Holocaust denial article on Facebook
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A senior official in the UK Labour Party resigned Wednesday night after it emerged that she had called for reinstating a local council candidate who had been suspended from the party for sharing on Facebook an article that claimed the Holocaust was a hoax.
Christine Shawcroft, who in January took up her post as head of the panel that deals with internal party disputes, re-admissions and conciliation, had argued that the “alleged” anti-Semitic Facebook post was “taken out of context.”
When news of her stance came out, Shawcroft apologized and resigned from her position on the panel. However, she has not stepped down from the party’s National Executive Committee, or from the party itself, despite calls to do so.
I sat across the NEC table from Christine for 6 yrs – sadly this is not unusual behaviour from her.
I hope our @jeremycorbyn and @JennieUnite deal with it quickly.
Stepping down as Chair of Disputes is not sufficient. Ignorance is no excuse. https://t.co/6p042c6XVX
— Johanna Baxter MP (@JohannaBaxter) March 29, 2018
After an internal email she sent setting out her position was leaked to the Times newspaper, Shawcroft said she was stepping down from her position on the panel.
Announcing her resignation in a statement, Shawcroft said when she had issued her recommendation, she hadn’t actually looked at the offending post. Only later did she become aware of the “abhorrent” content of the Facebook post that led to the suspension of Alan Bull last week.
Bull had shared a link last year on his Facebook page to an article titled “International Red Cross Report Confirms the Holocaust of Six Million Jews is a Hoax.” The article included a doctored photo of the entrance to the Auschwitz concentration camp with the famous slogan above the gates changed from the original “Arbeit Macht Frei (work sets you free) to “Muh Holocaust.”
The “Muh Holocaust” phrase is a reference to the notion held by some opponents of Israel that Jewish people use the Holocaust as way of deflecting criticism of Israel, the Daily Mail reported. Prior to his suspension, Bull was a Labour candidate in the upcoming Peterborough council elections scheduled for May 3.
https://twitter.com/tom7p/status/979240455232720898
Bull has said that he reposted the article for purpose of debate, the BBC reported.
On Sunday Shawcroft sent an internal email to fellow members of the party’s National Executive Committee in which she wrote that Bull’s post, which she described as “a Facebook post taken completely out of context and alleged to show anti-Semitism,” was being used in a political campaign against him by rival Labour members.
“I am concerned that party disciplinary procedures are being used in the pursuit of partisan disputes in local parties, wasting a great deal of staff time in the process,” she wrote.
She also noted that the party had known about the complaint for months without doing anything about it.
“I think we should reinstate his membership and allow him to contest the ward for which he has been selected,” she wrote.
Stepping down on Wednesday, she wrote: “I sent this email before being aware of the full information about this case and I had not been shown the image of his abhorrent Facebook post.
“Had I seen this image, I would not have requested that the decision to suspend him be re-considered. I am deeply sorry for having done so.”
“In light of this, I have decided to stand down as chair of the disputes panel to ensure my wrong and misguided questions on this case do not cause doubt or anxiety about our processes.”
Referring to a large demonstration by Jewish groups against alleged anti-Semitism in Labour that was held Monday outside parliament, Shawcroft wrote: “This week we have seen a clear expression of the pain and hurt that has been caused to Jewish members of our party and the wider Jewish community by anti-Semitic abuse and language, and by the reality of anti-Semitism being denied and downplayed by others.”
During the event, around 1,500 protesters massed outside the British parliament. It was an unprecedented rally organized by the usually publicity-averse Anglo-Jewish leadership, and attendees bore signs reading “No to anti-Semitism,” as pressure ramped up on Labour and its leader Jeremy Corbyn.
Also Wednesday, British Jewish leaders told Corbyn that they would only agree to his request for a meeting if he fulfills a number of conditions on tackling anti-Semitism within his party.
The Board of Deputies and the Jewish Leadership Council said the meeting, which Corbyn proposed after they organized the rally outside parliament, would only happen if the opposition leader took a number of public steps first, including taking responsibility for tackling anti-Semitism in his party and distancing himself from criticism of Labour lawmakers who attended Monday’s protest.
Allegations of Labour anti-Semitism have grown since Corbyn, a pro-Palestinian socialist, was elected leader of Britain’s main opposition party in 2015.
Some in the party say Corbyn, a longtime critic of Israeli policies regarding the Palestinians, has allowed abuse to go unchecked.
The latest furor erupted over a six-year-old Facebook post by Corbyn supporting the artist behind a street mural that included anti-Semitic stereotypes. Corbyn has said he regrets not looking closely at the “deeply disturbing and anti-Semitic” mural before offering support to the artist.
Agencies contributed to this report.
The Times of Israel Community.