Labour constituency chief suspended after tweets about Isis beheading Emily Thornberry emerge

Labour’s constituency chief in Lewisham East has been suspended pending an investigation after a tweet emerged about the shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry being beheaded by Isis.

Ian McKenzie, who was a policy adviser to the former deputy prime minister John Prescott, posted on his social media account in 2016 that Ms Thornberry was “too old” for Isis.

“They won’t make a sex slave of her,” he added. “They’ll behead her and dump her in a mass grave.”

Another tweet from the chairman of Lewisham East’s Constituency Labour Party (CLP) from 2015, read: “Maybe she’d agree sex slavery to one man only, provided he didn’t sell her on or insist on gang rape.”

A party source told The Independent: “The Labour party takes all complaints of abuse and discrimination extremely seriously. Any complaints are fully investigated and any appropriate disciplinary action taken in line with our rules and procedures.”

The emergence of his comments – unearthed by the left-wing activist and commentator Owen Jones – follow Mr Mckenzie’s ultimately successful campaign in Labour’s selection contest at the weekend for the upcoming by-election in June.

Janet Daby, Lewisham’s deputy mayor, who was backed by Mr McKenzie, defeated the Momentum supported candidate Sakina Sheikh and Claudia Webbe, a member of Labour’s governing body, who had the support of Unite union.

After the result, left-wing activists on Twitter shared several of Mr McKenzie’s tweets.

On Tuesday morning, Mr McKenzie said: "I was suspended from the Labour Party at 9.25am by email, although journalists had been been briefed many hours ago. I now know what the issue is and will clarify my position as soon as I can. Thank you to everyone who is sending private or public messages of support."

He later added in a statement: “I do not believe that Isis should kill Emily Thornberry, or kill anyone, and believe it is very clear I have never said I did.

“I apologise that my tweets in 2015 and 2016 were insufficiently clear in expressing these views, and that they have therefore caused offence.”

In an article for Politics Home, he continued: “Emily Thornberry is at an age at which she would be selected by Isis to be killed. I said so. I stated a fact that is disputed by no one. I did not advocate, nor joke about, Emily Thornberry’s killing, but the very opposite. My tweet was a deadly serious condemnation.

“I hope that this unfortunate conflagration can be swiftly ended and that I may be able to go back to doing what I do best: asking people to vote Labour.”

A spokesman for Ms Thornberry declined to comment on the remarks when approached by The Independent.

On Monday evening, Mr Mckenzie also stood down from his role as a policy adviser to Labour’s new mayor in Newham, Rokhsana Fiaz.

In a statement shared with colleagues, Ms Fiaz said: “In the last 24 hours there has been a lot of commentary on social media about Ian Mckenzie – who the council commissioned to provide external policy support for me on a short-term basis.

“The commentary on social media relates to tweets he wrote over the period December 2015 to January 2016; alongside his involvement in the recent Lewisham East Labour party parliamentary selection process which concluded over the weekend.

“In light of today’s developments, Ian has decided to step down from his role. I have accepted his decision as being the right one in this instance.”