My letter to Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell, January 12th 2017

The way forward : Al Jazeera and anti-Semitism smears

I am a Labour member, we follow each other on twitter, and I have just completed an article entitled “Building an evidence-based strategy against abuse & hate crimes” (attached) which I think may be very helpful for Labour.

 
I would like you to consider my article for building  future policies and actions regarding abuse, prejudice and discrimination inside the Labour Party and outside in wider society.

This is particularly true at the moment following the recent dramatic revelations by Al-Jazeera.

In fact, the damaging claims of anti-Semitism being endemic in Labour had already been shown to be false as demonstrated in the Chakrabarti report and acknowledged in the Home Affairs Committee report into anti-Semitism. Yet the JLM still seem to carry on with their propaganda and influence campaign as shown in the Al Jazeera investigation.

In order to protect our Labour Party democracy against future subversion there needs to be a full internal Labour Party inquiry, including into the activites of any implicated Labour MP’s, members and the LFI and JLM. 

The findings of such an inquiry I believe will result in a revision of our policies regarding abuse, discrimination and prejudice within the Labour Party and in our wider society.

Certainly we need to place attention to genuine anti-Semitism in proportion to that given to other categories of abuse. For my article I reviewed and analysed mainly Home Office statistics on Hate Crimes by victim groups, an example is illustrated below.

Currently the Labour Party resource allocation to tackle possible abuse from Labour Party members, and abuse or hate crimes in the wider UK population, does not seem to be based on such evidence as illustrated above.

In my article I also explore the evidence for other relevant aspects beyond these hate crime shares. This includes victim group population size, the pro rata risk of an assault, relative prejudice and discrimination, negative political rhetoric and media coverage, trigger events and the relative risk for a future genocide for each group. If anything this mostly strengthens the above prioritisation of resources based on share of hate crimes.

This apparent bias on anti-Semitism has serious consequences for many hate crime victim groups. For instance, excessive attention on Labour members distracts from the far right perpetrators reported to be responsible for 70% of genuine and more serious anti-Semitic hate crimes in society. More importantly, although all hate crimes are dreadful, anti-Semitic hate crimes represented only 1.5% of the 62 518 reported to the police in the 12 months to March 2016. By their emphasis, the Labour Party may also be letting down the other 98.5% of victims who are not given the relative attention they deserve.

The people I am keen to contact are those in the Labour organisation with responsibilities or interests in;

• The development or revision of an evidence-based Labour Policy against abuse, prejudice, racism, and anti-Semitism, but also involving the LGBT, Disabled and non-hate crime victim groups.

• A related evidence-based programme to reduce prejudice and abuse with Labour members. The emphasis would be on awareness, education, and training. However, any eventual scrutiny and sanctioning programme for Labour members needs to be based on evidence, be transparent and not politically driven as now.

• Encouraging individuals from all victim groups into the Labour Party and ensuring equal opportunities and treatment (not the case currently according to S. Chakrabarti).

• Offering support for victim groups (BAME, LGBT, Disabled, Muslims, Gypsies, Jews etc.)

• Labour voter-targeting strategies with policies to attract the following individuals;

–        11 million Disabled

–       7.5 million BAME (around 50-60% voted Labour in 2015)

–        3.6 million LGBT

–        2.7 million Muslims (some also in BAME group)

–        263 000 Jews (in one poll, only 22%, voted Labour in 2015)

–       All those who care about any of the above victim groups

The Labour Party would need a campaign training programme to prepare Labour members to both satisfy the above  victim groups that we are the best Party for them, and to handle the negative doorstep challenges on Immigrants and Muslims in particular

I have sent my article to a few Labour MP’s and one NEC member, so I hope you can support some of my proposals and help take the Labour Party back to where it should be.

After the growth in the far right across the world and the increased anti-foreigner atmosphere in the UK following the brexit vote, it is time for the Labour Party to build an evidence-based strategy to tackle all forms of abuse, racism, and all categories of hate crime, to be implemented both inside and outside of our Party.
We cannot allow anti-Corbyn politics or alleged Israeli embassy subversion of our Labour Party democracy to dictate such an important issue. 

Thanks for all your excellent work and very best wishes for 2017,

Alan