Anti-Semitism

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Louise Ellman

Tuesday 17th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Louise Ellman (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab/Co-op)]

Anti-Semitism is a centuries-old virus that mutates but never goes away. As we have heard from my hon. Friends, the reality of anti-Semitism is felt every day by many members of the Jewish community. It is present across the whole political spectrum, but this debate takes place against the background of the furore in the Labour party. The refusal to accept and address anti-Semitism in our ranks led to an unprecedented response from the mainstream Jewish community, when more than 1,000 people poured into Parliament Square in their anger and anguish, to protest against the Labour party’s inaction in dealing with anti-Semitism.

I commend the 40-plus non-Jewish MPs and peers who joined that rally. Those who denounced the demonstrators as having dubious motives, subject to manipulation, and accused them of using this issue to smear the Labour leadership, must ask themselves whether they would make that allegation against any other minority group. I think not. They should look in the mirror and ask themselves why—why do they regard Jewish people in a different light from all others?

It is a fallacy to believe that people who profess to be anti-racist cannot be anti-Semitic, and that anti-Semitism is confined to the right wing of politics. The notion of conspiratorial, powerful Jews—or Zionists—controlling international capital and manipulating the media for their own ends is to be found on the left as well. It is all too evident in the Labour party’s current problem with anti-Semitism.

The small British Jewish community—less than 0.5% of the population—is increasingly disturbed by the growth and normalisation of anti-Semitism. They understand that anti-Semitism comes from all political parties and from right across society, but when that anti-Semitism grows unchallenged in a mainstream political party—a party of Government—they simply feel frightened. Together with feeling frightened, they feel angry and anguished. I share that anguish as I meet, day by day, Jewish members of the Labour party who tell me that they can no longer continue in the party that they once held dear—the party that they now feel has betrayed them. I read with horror reports of Labour Jewish councillors who feel that they can no longer serve as councillors because they are Jewish. They feel that the Labour party is no longer for them. That is outrageous and despicable.

The Labour party—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Very unusually, I shall allow the hon. Lady to finish her sentence.

[Mrs Ellman]

The Labour party claims that it now recognises the problem; I will believe that when I see action and we no longer have members espousing holocaust denial and equivocation, invoking the Rothschilds, or declaring that the Jews were the main financiers of the slave trade.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Three minutes means three minutes; it says it on the clock.