What does the Labour Party Anti-Semitism report really mean?

In October, the Equality and Human Rights Commission released its report into the investigation of the Labour Party’s allegations of antisemitism. The report identified ‘serious failings’ in the process of providing adequate training for those handling anti-Semitism complaints and leadership.

What is anti-Semitism?

The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) defines Antisemitism as “a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews.” A total of 31 countries have adopted the IHRA definition of antisemitism, as well as more than 130 UK local councils, the police, the Crown Prosecution Service, and the judiciary.

The Labour party, under the leadership of Jeremy Corbyn, adopted the IHRA’s antisemitism definition in full after Labour previously said it would adopt the definition but omit several of the IHRA's examples of antisemitic behaviour, including one relating to claiming the creation of a state of Israel is a "racist endeavour".

According to the 2011 Census, just under three hundred thousand people identified themselves as Jewish by religion in the UK – 0.43% of the total population. Tim Sluckin, secretary at the Southampton Hebrew Congregation, where people who identify as Jewish make up 0.1 % of the population, spoke on the history of antisemitism in British politics:

"The case is Jews tend to be more left-wing than people of a similar Socio-Economic Class, for example in 1945 there were I think twenty-eight Jewish MPs, twenty-six of them were sitting for the Labour Party, so historically the Jews have a big link to the Labour Party and historically the antisemitism would've been in the Conservative Party, so that's one of the reasons why that's really upsetting to see what is effectively racism in the party."

What did Labour do?

The investigation found the Labour Party to have breached the Equality Act 2010. The act works as a discrimination law which covers:

• Equal pay
• Gender discrimination
• Race discrimination
• Age discrimination
• Disability discrimination
• Religion and beliefs discrimination
• Sexual orientation

The Labour Party breached the act through discrimination and Harassment by its agents against its Jewish members with two individuals of unlawful harassment named and another 18 cases mentioned.

Ken Livingstone, a Labour Party National Executive Committee member and former Mayor of London, was one of the two individuals specifically called out. He posted on social media posts made by Naz Shah MP which said Israel should be relocated to the United States, with the caption ‘problem solved’, and in another post in which she compared Israeli policies to those of Hitler. Naz Shah apologised for her comments in Parliament but Ken Livingstone denied that the posts were antisemitic and alleged that it was part of a smear campaign and was intended to undermine the leadership of Jeremy Corbyn.

The antisemitism found in Ken Livingstone’s actions comes under the use of antisemitic tropes specifically the reference to Jewish people as ‘fifth column.’ Local Rossendale Borough Councillor, Pam Bromley, was the second individual and was found to have committed unlawful harassment by suggesting that complaints of antisemitism are fake.

She posted on Facebook ‘Looks like fake accusations of antisemitism to undermine Labour just aren’t working, so let’s have Chris Williamson reinstated’.

The report suggested the effect of this antisemitism created an ‘intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive’ environment for labour Party members.

The antisemitism complaint handling system was described in the report as ‘inconsistent, poor, and lacking in transparency.’ This was directly compared to its handling of complaints about sexual harassment which the investigation used to compare.

It found on the Labour Party’s complaints pages on its website that there is no mention of antisemitism other than selecting it as an option for ‘what kind of complaint is being made’.

The Labour Party has a separate webpage with resources called ‘No Place for Antisemitism’, including a page on which it publishes statistics on disciplinary cases but there is no reference or link to this page on the complaints page of the website.

This is in comparison to sexual harassment complaints in which the website’s complaints page has a dedicated section on sexual harassment, including guidance, access to an independent specialist advice service, and a separate portal for complaints. There is also a published policy and procedure document that sets out the complaint handling process.

Leader of the labour party at the time, Jeremy Corbyn influenced decision-making in complaints outside of established processes. The investigation found 23 cases of interference by Jeremy Corbyn from a total of 70 files looked at.

One instance in which Jeremy Corbyn was alleged to be supportive of an antisemitic mural was told should be dismissed.  The Leader of the Opposition’s Office working directly under the leader was involved in and advising of dismissal. The party suspended the former leader, pending an internal investigation, he stated the issue of antisemitism was ‘dramatically overstated for political reasons.’

The labour party’s current leader, Keir Starmer said on the day of the release of the report that it was a ‘day of shame for the Labour Party’

What next?

The Chakrabarti Inquiry, a previous investigation into antisemitism in the Labour Party, concluded that the party had issues with antisemitism but was not ‘overrun by anti-Semitism or other forms of racism.’

The Labour Party implemented part of the recommendations from that inquiry but failed to implement some of its key recommendations.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission report gave an unlawful act notice, which gives the party until 10 December to draft an action plan to implement the recommendations otherwise will be legally enforced by the court.

Keir Starmer responded by saying, ‘The Labour Party I lead accepts this report in full and without qualification. We will implement all the recommendations and we will implement them in full.’