Labour antisemitism report could spark 'furious' clashes within party

Sir Keir Starmer will attempt to repair the damage from a damning report on Labour antisemitism allegations, which senior party figures have condemned as "shameful" and "appalling".

The Labour leader will issue an instant response to a report published by the Equality and Human Rights Commission into accusations of anti-Jewish racism during Jeremy Corbyn's leadership.

Sir Keir - who vowed when he became leader to "tear this poison out by its roots" - is likely to repeat a pledge he made at Labour's conference last month, when he declared: "This is a party under new leadership.

"As I promised on my first day as leader, we will root out the antisemitism that has infected our party. We're making progress - and we will root it out, once and for all."

But Mr Corbyn and his left-wing allies in the party will come out fighting, potentially rejecting the findings of the report and accusing Sir Keir and his inner circle of pursuing a vendetta against them.

As a result, the scene is set for a furious clash between supporters of the present and former leaders, which could seriously undermine Sir Keir's hopes of putting the row behind him.

Karie Murphy, Mr Corbyn's former chief of staff, who was accused by former party staffers of meddling in antisemitism cases, said this week the handling of disciplinary cases improved during his leadership.

"Under Jeremy Corbyn's leadership, antisemites were removed from the Labour Party more quickly, transparently and effectively than ever before," she wrote in The Guardian.

"As his former chief of staff, I'm proud of that record."

The commission launched its 18-month inquiry after whistleblowers, backed by senior Jewish MPs, claimed the party was institutionally antisemitic in its handling of complaints and in its party structures.

The equalities watchdog, a body created by the Labour government in 2007, previously took action against the British National Party over rules that only allowed white members.

When it launched its inquiry into Labour it said it would examine whether the party "unlawfully discriminated against, harassed or victimised people because they are Jewish".

Speaking ahead of the report's publication, shadow cabinet member Jonathan Ashworth - asked in a Times Radio interview if the investigation was the most shameful moment in the party's history - admitted: "It probably was, yes.

"That was a shameful period in our history, and we have to be clear that we are never going back to that, and we will do everything we can to repair relations with the Jewish community who are understandably and quite rightly hurt by the Labour Party's failure to deal with this in recent years."

Labour's former foreign secretary, David Miliband, who is Jewish, also said Mr Corbyn's failure to deal with antisemitism was shameful.

"What I'm clear about is that he failed to deal with this issue in a way that was appalling in all its aspects," he also told Times Radio.

"Whether it be cartoons or statements, they reflected a complete blindness to the issue and to the importance of it.

"I can honestly say I never thought I would see the day when the word antisemitism and Labour were in the same sentence, never mind headline, never mind commission on human rights investigation.

"It's a dreadful, dark, shameful period and the failure to be clear, the failure to be decisive, the failure to say that anyone who is an antisemite isn't welcome in the Labour Party, the failure to clear that out, is a source of shame for me as someone who's still a member of the Labour Party, who's proud to be in the Labour Party and knows how many good people are in the Labour Party, fantastic people."

Earlier, leading Jewish Labour MP Dame Margaret Hodge said: "I'm hoping this will be the beginning of the end for those of us who have been fighting antisemitism in the Labour Party for five long years."

And former Labour cabinet minister Ed Balls, long-time Gordon Brown ally and now co-chair with Tory grandee Eric Pickles of the Holocaust Memorial Foundation, said the episode was "a tragedy and a disaster".

The commission's inquiry followed demands for an investigation from Jewish groups including the Campaign Against Antisemitism and the Jewish Labour Movement.

Ahead of the report's publication, the Campaign Against Antisemitism's chief executive, Gideon Falter, said: "Under Jeremy Corbyn's leadership, the Labour Party became institutionally antisemitic and drove almost half of British Jews to consider leaving the country.

"The party must be forever changed after this episode so this can never happen again. Those responsible remain in the party and must be held to account if Sir Keir Starmer is to tear antisemitism 'out by its roots', as he has promised."

Fiona Sharpe of Labour Against Antisemitism added: "Our hope is that Keir Starmer will use its findings to begin the difficult but necessary process of returning the Labour Party to becoming a valid party of government once again.

"But whatever its verdict, the Jewish community will continue to carry the wounds of five years of institutional antisemitism within the Labour Party. Their pain will always be a scar on the reputation and conscience of the entire Labour movement."

Mr Balls, also speaking on Times Radio, said: "If Jeremy had come out quickly, in a very clear way, and said not only that antisemitism is wrong, but that it will be rooted out in the Labour Party, and that there are things I have done and said in the past, which I now regret, and I apologise for, things could have moved on.

"I don't think Jeremy Corbyn is an antisemite. He's not a racist man, but he undoubtedly not only stood with antisemitic people, but said things which were antisemitic.

"And because he wasn't able to acknowledge that, his sort of anti-American, anti-liberal, anti-capitalist belief in his own anti-racist credentials, I think blinded him to the reality.

"If the leader can't acknowledge that, and apologise and move on, it means that the whole party is then hamstrung in tackling the genuine antisemites who've always believed those antisemitic tropes and want to use it for their own political reasons. And so it was a tragedy and a disaster."