UK Elections: Abuse and Intimidation

Diane Abbott Excerpts

Wednesday 12th July 2017 Westminster Hall

[Ms Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)]

This is a very important debate, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire (Simon Hart) on securing it. We have to be clear that we are talking not about robust debate, however robust it is, but about mindless abuse. In my case, the mindless abuse has been characteristically racist and sexist. I have had death threats, and people tweeting that I should be hanged

“if they could find a tree big enough to take the fat bitch’s weight”.

There was an English Defence League-affiliated Twitter account—#burnDianeAbbot. I have had rape threats, and been described as a

“Pathetic useless fat black piece of shit”,

an “ugly, fat black bitch”, and a “nigger”—over and over again. One of my members of staff said that the most surprising thing about coming to work for me is how often she has to read the word “nigger”. It comes in through emails, Twitter and Facebook.

Where I disagree with the hon. Gentleman is that he seems to suggest that this is all a relatively recent occurrence in this election. That is not my experience. It is certainly true that the online abuse that I and others experience has got worse in recent years, and that it gets worse at election time, but I do not put it down to a particular election. I think the rise in the use of online media has turbocharged abuse. Thirty years ago, when I first became an MP, if someone wanted to attack an MP, they had to write a letter—usually in green ink—put it in an envelope, put a stamp on it and walk to the post box. Now, they press a button and we read vile abuse that, 30 years ago, people would have been frightened even to write down.

I accept that male politicians get abuse, too, but I hope the one thing we can agree on in this Chamber is that it is much worse for women. As well as the rise of online media, it is helped by anonymity. People would not come up to me and attack me for being a nigger in public, but they do it online. It is not once a week or during an election; it is every day. My staff switch on the computer and go on to Facebook and Twitter, and they see this stuff.

[Andrew Percy]

I agree with everything the right hon. Lady is saying, but I do not think my hon. Friend the Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire (Simon Hart) was saying that this is a new thing. We have all had it for years on social media, and the right hon. Lady has had it in a particularly terrible way. What is different now is that some of this is being driven by political leaders’ language. When someone addresses a rally where there are posters of the severed head of the Prime Minister and they do not do anything about it, and when leaders say “ditch the bitch” in relation to the Prime Minister, that is the problem we have at the moment: it is the dehumanisation of each other in politics.

[Ms Abbott]

We will have to agree to disagree.

[Victoria Atkins (Louth and Horncastle) (Con)]

Will the right hon. Lady give way?

[Ms Abbott]

I am afraid I cannot give way, because I am mindful of the time.

The type of racist and sexist abuse I get is not tied to any events in this particular election campaign. This is not about just politicians or even women politicians. Any woman who goes into the public space can expect that type of abuse. People will remember how Mary Beard, the historian, received horrible abuse online because she was on “Question Time”.

[David Hanson (in the Chair)]

Order. The right hon. Lady is making a powerful speech, but I am conscious that we have only 11 minutes to get other Members in, so I hope she will draw her remarks to a conclusion.

[Ms Abbott]

In closing, I want to make a couple of points, the first of which is that there is a relationship between online abuse and mainstream media commentary; in my office, we always see, at the very least, a spike in abuse after there has been a lot of negative stuff in the media. Online abuse and abuse generally are not the preserve of any one party or any one party faction, and to pretend that is to devalue a very important argument. I am glad we have had the debate—it gives me no pleasure to talk about my experience not only in the last election, but for years—but let us get this debate straight: it is not about a particular party or a particular faction, but about the degradation of public discourse online.