“With the General Election looming, we must demand Keir Starmer restores the whip!”
By Logan Willians
Earlier this year, we saw the racist hatred faced by Diane Abbott – needless to say a bastion of the Labour Left and titan within the broader labour and social movements for decades– put under the national spotlight when it came out that the £10 million Tory party donor Frank Hester had said Diane Abbott on tv made him “just want to hate all black women because she’s there” and would later go onto state that he thinks “she should be shot”. Hester’s comments should not be dismissed as the crack pot ideas of one rogue Tory donor but, instead reflect a reactionary shift in the politics of both the establishment and British society which see’s the politics expressed by Diane as a threat that must be targeted as can be seen in Amnesty’s previous report into political targeting which placed Diane as the most targeted politician in Britain.
These racist and misogynistic attacks on Diane are not just a direct attack on Diane and the politics she stands for, they are part of a broader shift to the extreme right of British politics across both the establishment and, society more broadly. This can be seen in Lee Anderson, the former Conservative Party Deputy Chair’s claim that Islamists are ‘in control of London’ or former Home Secretary Suella Braverman’s claim that “Islamists” are “in charge” of Britain.
It is in recognition of this extreme right-wing offensive that two of the largest trade unions in Britain namely, the University College Union and the National Education Union, quickly expressed their total solidarity with Diane through various means. The UCU national executive rightfully recognised that not only had the “Tories refused to return donations from someone who spoke in deeply hateful, racist and misogynistic terms… but our Prime Minster refused to call it out and tried to suggest that a feeble apology was enough and should be accepted”. They would go on to “condemn the blatant double standards being applied to Diane Abbott by politicians on all sides of the house” as well as the “actions of this cruel and divisive government in whipping up racial and misogynistic tensions year after year for their own gain”.
They also explicitly called for the Parliamentary Labour Party whip to be restored to Diane, joining growing calls from across society and the Labour Party in support of Diane at that point, including the likes of Ed Balls, Harriet Harman and John McTiernan.
The National Education Union’s annual conference passed an Urgent Motion on the impact of racist language and violence on schools and communities. It was within this motion that the NEU recognised both the “2022 internal Labour Party Forde report which identified ‘overt and underlying racism and sexism’ towards Abbott and other Black MPs” within the Labour Party hierarchy and that the comments made by Hester towards Britain’s longest serving Black MP “normalises violence against women” and as such the Union voted overwhelmingly to offer its fully solidarity to Diane Abbott as well as strengthening its anti-fascist and anti-racist work. Following this debate NEU General Secretary Daniel Kebede would state the union “wants Diane Abbott and other women in public life to be able to do their jobs free from intimidation and threats”. He continued by stating that “comments and ideas which espouse violent, hateful rhetoric and encourage violence have no place in national public debate” as it will lead to serious consequences for the union’s members in education settings across the country.
The actions undertaken by both these Unions, in standing up and demanding justice for Diane Abbott – which must include the Parliamentary Labour Party whip being restored -reflects an understanding that the labour movement cannot stand idly by whilst the politics Diane has trailblazed within the British political sphere is tarnished and targeted by politicians and commentators who are not fit to tie the laces of Diane Abbott. Following on from the campaigning work of the Voice newspaper, Labour Left groups and others the actions of UCU and NEU activists helped to lay down a gauntlet of action which the rest of the movement has been taking up more and more and has become urgent with the General Election being called. To give just two examples, the General Secretaries of four affiliated unions recently wrote to Keir Starmer demanding that the whip be restored, and over 15,000 people have now signed the petition on the same lines initiated by Arise – a Festival of Left Ideas and the Labour Assembly Against Austerity.
We must continue to build as broad a movement as possible in solidarity with the politics best represented in Diane Abbott’s lifetime of work; solidarity, socialism and, the core labour movement ideal that unity is strength. And with the General Election looming, we must demand Keir Starmer restores the whip!
- Over 15,000 activists have signed a petition to Keir Starmer calling on him to restore the whip to Diane Abbott. Add your name here.
- The General Secretaries of four affiliated trade unions – ASLEF, CWU, FBU and TSSA – recently wrote to Keir Starmer calling for the whip to be restored to Diane Abbott. You can read it in full here.
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