THE Jewish Labour Movement (JLM) has said it has no confidence in Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership following several anti-Semitism rows within the party.
The no-confidence vote was passed “overwhelmingly” at JLM’s annual general meeting, the group said.
JLM added that Labour MPs Dame Margaret Hodge, Ruth Smeeth and Louise Ellman gave “strong speeches” at the event at a north-London synagogue.
But shadow attorney general Baroness Chakrabarti had warned to “personalise” the issue by focusing on Corbyn.
“My plea to the Jewish Labour Movement is to stay in the Labour movement and to tackle racism together, not to personalise it and make it about Jeremy Corbyn, because he is one person and he won’t be leader forever,” she said.
JLM’s meeting took place after the party found itself embroiled in a new row over the handling of anti-Semitism complaints.
The Sunday Times said it had seen leaked documents showing the party’s system for complaints had been beset by delays, inaction and interference from the leader’s office.
Some members investigated for posting comments online such as “Heil Hitler” and “Jews are the problem” had not been expelled despite complaints being made a year ago, while Corbyn’s office had been involved in approving, delaying or blocking at least 101 complaints, the paper reported.
The paper said 454 of 863 complaints were unresolved, and of 409 cases where decisions had been made, fewer than 30 had been expelled.
But Labour defended itself, with a spokeswoman saying lines had been “selectively leaked from emails to misrepresent their overall contents”.
“The Labour Party takes all complaints of anti-Semitism extremely seriously and we are committed to rooting it out of our party. All complaints about anti-Semitism are fully investigated in line with our rules and procedures. We can’t comment on individual cases,” she continued.
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