Subhan Abdullah
LONDON (Reuters) – Diane Abbott, Britain's first black female MP, said on Wednesday she was banned from standing as a Labour candidate in the July 4 general election after being suspended from parliament more than a year ago for comments about Jews and racism.
Abbott was first elected as a Labour MP in 1987 and is Britain's longest serving black MP, having campaigned in his north-east London constituency on issues including racism, poverty and global affairs.
She was a close ally of Jeremy Corbyn, who led the party from 2015 to 2020 and has been accused by equality watchdogs of unlawful harassment and discrimination against Jewish people.
He was replaced by Keir Starmer, polls suggest he will be Britain's next prime minister, as he seeks to purge some of his party's left-wing members and address allegations of anti-Semitism.
“My leadership of the party has been reinstated but I am barred from standing as a Labour candidate,” Mr Abbott told the BBC, referring to the procedure for being reinstated as a Labour MP after being suspended from the party.
Mr Abbott was suspended last year after writing a letter to the Observer newspaper saying the prejudice experienced by Jews was similar to, but not the same as, racism.
“They have undoubtedly experienced prejudice, which is similar to racism and the two words are often used as if they are interchangeable,” she wrote in the letter.
“It is true that many types of white people who are different, such as redheads, can experience this prejudice.”
“But they haven't been exposed to racism their whole lives.”
Mr Abbott apologised “unreservedly” but was expelled from the party.
Corbyn was also barred from standing as a Labour candidate after saying anti-Semitism within the party had been “grossly exaggerated” for political reasons, and last week he decided to stand as an independent.
The equality watchdog launched an investigation into Labour in 2019 and found serious failings in the left-wing party's response to anti-Semitism.
Mr Abbott's supporters and opposition politicians alleged he had been mistreated by the party after the decision that he could not stand as Labor's candidate was first reported in The Times on Tuesday.
Jacqueline McKenzie, a human rights lawyer and friend of Mr Abbott, told BBC radio that he should have been accorded “greater respect and dignity than these leaks”.
“We've seen other senators make horrible comments and still have their floor leader reinstated and their candidacy allowed. Why is Diane being treated differently? This also impacts the entire Afro-Caribbean community. People are very concerned.”
During his time as an MP, Abbott has frequently been the target of racist and sexist slurs online.
In March, a Conservative donor apologized for saying in 2019 that Mr Abbott made him want to hate all black women and that she “should be shot.”
(Reporting by Subhan Abdullah; Editing by Andrew MacAskill and Toby Chopra)
