Month: February 2023

Mr Corbyn said it was up to local party members to choose their candidate, not Labour leaders.

The Islington North MP, who sits as an independent, was suspended as a Labour MP in 2020 in a row over antisemitism.

Sir Keir said Labour had changed, and people who did not like it could leave.

In a statement posted on Twitter, Mr Corbyn said: “Keir Starmer’s statement about my future is a flagrant attack on the democratic rights of Islington North Labour Party members. It is up to them – not party leaders – to decide who their candidate should be.

“Any attempt to block my candidacy is a denial of due process, and should be opposed by anybody who believes in the value of democracy.”

He described Sir Keir’s move as “a divisive distraction from our overriding goal: to defeat the Conservative Party at the next general election”.

The BBC understands that Mr Corbyn is still likely to seek the Labour Party nomination in Islington North, forcing party bosses to formally block him from being a Labour candidate.

Mr Corbyn has previously declined to comment on speculation he might stand against Labour as an independent candidate and his latest statement did not address this issue.

But former shadow home secretary Diane Abbott, one of his longest-standing allies, said he had “no intention of standing as an independent”, having been a member of the Labour Party since he was 16.

Earlier Sir Keir had confirmed for the first time that his predecessor as party leader would not be allowed to represent Labour at the next election, saying the party had changed and “we are not going back”.

He was speaking at a news conference in east London, after Britain’s equalities watchdog said Labour had improved how it handled antisemitism complaints.

In 2020, the Equality and Human Rights Commission found Labour, under Mr Corbyn, had been responsible for unlawful harassment and discrimination.

But a new report by the watchdog said it was now satisfied sufficient changes had been made.

Sir Keir said this was “an important moment in the history of the Labour Party” but “not one for celebration”. He stressed it was “not the end of the road” and promised “zero tolerance of antisemitism, of racism, of discrimination of any kind”.

Labour was “unrecognisable from 2019 and it will never go back… if you don’t like that, if you don’t like the changes we have made, I say the door is open and you can leave”, he added.

Momentum, the left-wing campaign group set up to support Mr Corbyn when he was Labour leader, has also called for local members in Islington North to be allowed to decide their candidate.

The group said in a statement: “We… will not allow ourselves to be driven out of the party. What we’ve witnessed today is an attempt to dishearten and demoralise us.

“The door might be open – but we’re not leaving.”

Mr Corbyn was suspended as a Labour MP by Sir Keir for saying, in his response to the 2020 EHRC report, that the scale of antisemitism within Labour had been”dramatically overstated” by his opponents and much of the media.

He also said antisemitism was “absolutely abhorrent” and “one antisemite is one too many” in the party.

He was readmitted to the wider party after saying concerns about antisemitism had been neither “exaggerated nor overstated”, but he remains barred from representing Labour in Parliament.

Mr Corbyn led Labour to defeat in the 2017 and 2019 general elections but remains a popular figure with many on the left of the party. From 2016, Sir Keir was a key member of his shadow cabinet, speaking for the party on Brexit.

The SNP leader made the announcement on Wednesday after more than eight years in the job.

She plans to remain in office until her successor is elected.

The SNP’s national executive committee will meet on Thursday evening to draw up a timetable for a leadership race.

With no obvious successor, the party’s first leadership contest in nearly 20 years could see a debate on future direction and strategy.

Possible replacements include:

Full profiles here.

Ms Sturgeon made her announcement at a hastily convened news conference at her official Edinburgh residence, Bute House, but insisted it was a decision she had been weighing up for some time.

She said that in order to serve well, a politician needed to accept when it was time to make way for someone else.

“In my head and in my heart I know that time is now. That it’s right for me, for my party and my country,” she said.

Ms Sturgeon said her departure was not in response to the “latest period of pressure”, which has included controversies over gender recognition reforms, trans prisoners and the strategy on independence.

She emphasised the huge pressures and sacrifices that came with serving in high office, adding: “I am a human being as well as a politician.”

She intends to remain an MSP until at least the next Holyrood election.

The party’s ruling body will now also have to decide on whether to go ahead with a special conference due to take place in March to discuss Ms Sturgeon’s strategy of using the next general election as a de facto independence referendum.

The SNP’s Westminster leader Stephen Flynn, who ruled himself out of the leadership contest, has called for the conference to be paused until a new leader is elected.

In her resignation speech, Ms Sturgeon said her party had an “array of talent” who could replace her as first minister.

The SNP’s constitution says a candidate for party leader needs to have the backing of 100 members from at least 20 different SNP branches, with nominations already open.

If there is more than one candidate, a vote of party members will choose the new leader.

Michael Russell, the party’s president, said he expected the process to be “shortened” and that it would be a “contested election”.

He told Radio 4’s PM: “I think that will be good for the SNP, to have different points of view contesting in a respectful way.

“I think we will decide that pretty soon and have a clear timetable that will take us forward.”

Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said there was now a belief in Scotland that a UK Labour government was possible for the first time since the party lost power in 2010, although he acknowledged that “significant gains” would be needed at the next election.

“For 12 years I don’t think people in Scotland have believed that a Labour UK government was possible – I think that is changing now,” he told the BBC.

The Scottish Conservatives disagreed, with party leader Douglas Ross telling the BBC that his party were the “clear challengers to the SNP in multiple seats across Scotland”.

Mr Ross also accused Ms Sturgeon of having presided over “a decade of division and decay in Scotland”.

More than 100 unionists gathered in central Glasgow on Wednesday evening to celebrate Ms Sturgeon’s resignation.

Ms Sturgeon rose to power unopposed after the independence referendum in 2014, taking over from Alex Salmond who decided to resign following the vote to remain part of the UK.

She is the longest-serving first minister and the first woman to hold the position. She has worked as an MSP since the Scottish parliament was opened in 1999.

Originally from Irvine in North Ayrshire, she has campaigned for the SNP since she was a teenager.

In her resignation announcement she said she intended to remain active in politics, championing causes including Scottish independence and improving the life chances of children who have grown up in care.

Previously she has suggested she might consider becoming a foster parent. There has also been speculation that she might continue to play a role on the world stage with an organisation such as the United Nations.

In an era of what has often felt like near permanent political revolution, the churning in and then churning out of leader-after-leader, there has been what has felt, in contrast, like a near permanent leader of the Scottish government. But no more.

The SNP must now find, and quickly, a replacement. It is far from obvious who that will be.

What does feel clearer is that Ms Sturgeon’s political opponents are relieved she is going – and that is a compliment to her. Many who want to see the union preserved have longed for this day for some time, convinced her replacement will not be anywhere near as effective. Let us see.

For now, a huge figure in Scottish politics and a big figure on the UK political stage prepares to depart, and Scotland prepares for new political leadership.

The UN said 11 lorries crossed from Turkey at Bab al-Salameh on Tuesday.

Many Syrians are angry over the lack of aid for the war-torn nation especially to rebel areas, after last week’s quakes in which more than 41,000 are known to have died in Turkey and Syria.

The UN and Syria’s government on Monday agreed to use two more crossings.

The other one is at al-Rai, also on the Turkish border. The UN said the crossings would initially be open for three months.

Two powerful earthquakes struck the south-eastern regions of neighbouring Turkey on 6 February early in the morning, when many people were asleep.

Hopes of finding any more survivors are fading.

Countries with friendly relations with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, including Russia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates, began flying supplies to government-controlled areas of Syria soon after the tremor.

But the opposition-controlled north-west – where some 4.1 million people were relying on humanitarian assistance to survive even before the disaster – received no aid deliveries from the UN via Turkey until Thursday.

The UN blamed damage to roads leading to the Bab al-Hawa crossing, which until now was the the only land route the UN Security Council has authorised it to use.

On Tuesday, the Syrian ambassador to the UN, Bassam al-Sabbagh, told the BBC’s Radio 4’s World Tonight programme that there would be be no discrimination over who was getting relief aid.

And he blamed the delay in opening more aid routes on what he called the “terrorist opposition” which controls the north-west.

In a separate development, on Monday night gunmen stormed a Syrian hospital caring for a baby girl who was born under the rubble of her family’s earthquake-shattered home, a hospital official was quoted as saying by the Associated Press news agency.

The official said the attackers beat the facility’s director – but denied reports on social media that they had sought to kidnap the baby named Aya.

Thousands of people have offered to adopt Aya – whose name means miracle in Arabic – who was born under the rubble of a collapsed building in the north-western town of Jindayris. When she was rescued, she was still connected to her mother by her umbilical cord.

Her mother, father and all four of her siblings died in the quake.

The King spoke to a Syrian man who had lost his mother, father and other family in this “catastrophe”.

“Seven days my family were under the rubble and no rescue teams reached them,” said Salah Al-Asmar.

The King was hearing first-hand stories from the Syrian community in an event at Trafalgar Square in London.

A temporary “Syria House” has been opened in the square, providing a focus for the earthquake relief efforts of the Syrian community in the UK, many already displaced by the country’s civil war.

Mr Al-Asmar, who works with the White Helmets emergency relief group, was originally from Syria, but his family had been living across the border in Turkey when they were lost in the earthquake.

“I couldn’t sleep for seven days, before I heard, unfortunately, all of them had died,” said Mr Al-Asmar, who had been comforted by the King.

“We need more help,” he told the King, calling for a more rapid response from the international community, when thousands of lives had been lost and “thousands of houses have been totally destroyed”.

The King asked if enough assistance was arriving, but he was told of delays – and he called over a Foreign Office aide to speak to the Syrian family.

Mr Al-Asmar said the impact of the earthquake was even worse than Syria’s war.

“We faced airstrikes, we faced forced displacement, we faced clashes, but we didn’t face such a catastrophe,” he said.

“There is a need for hospitals, doctors… food support, schools.”

And Syrians in the UK who were asylum seekers were struggling to be able to travel back to find their relatives, said Mr Al-Asmar.

The King heard from other grieving families and was shown pictures and films of the damage caused by the earthquake and was given a traditional offering of Syrian coffee and dates.

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan was also on the visit to the Syria House in Trafalgar Square, which will be used to draw attention to the scale of the humanitarian disaster.

Earlier in the day, the King had met volunteers from the UK’s Turkish community who had also been organising help for people caught up in the earthquake.

The King, who had personally donated to the Disasters Emergency Committee fund, had said he was “deeply sorry” about the earthquake.

Buckingham Palace said the King had wanted to meet these community groups involved in relief efforts.

“He has been kept abreast of developments and is determined to help not just with financial support but to help with as much practical support as possible and raise awareness as to what is going on in both nations,” said a palace source.

The party was forced to reform its policies after a highly critical report by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) in 2020.

It found Labour had been responsible for unlawful discrimination during Jeremy Corbyn’s time in charge.

Leader Sir Keir Starmer said the party was “heading in the right direction”.

The EHRC has now said it is “content with the actions taken” by the party and will be winding up a two-year monitoring period.

Sir Keir said it marked “an important moment in the history of the Labour Party”.

The EHRC launched its inquiry in May 2019, during Mr Corbyn’s tenure, after receiving a number of complaints regarding antisemitism within the party.

Its report, published in October 2020, found Labour had breached the Equality Act by failing to provide adequate training for staff dealing with complaints.

The watchdog also said the party had breached the Act because of “political interference” from Mr Corbyn’s office in the handling of complaints.

Labour was ordered to draw up a plan to improve its complaints process, which it did in December 2020.

This committed the party to setting up an independent process to handle complaints, putting together a handbook for staff handling complaints and improving training.

EHRC chief executive Marcial Boo said his organisation had concluded its two-year monitoring process at the end of January, following a final meeting with the party in December.

“We were satisfied that the party had implemented the necessary actions to improve its complaints, recruitment, training and other procedures to the legal standards required,” he said.

He added that the watchdog would keep in contact with Labour, to make sure they kept on top of the action plan.

Welcoming the EHRC’s decision, Sir Keir apologised on behalf of the party to those who had suffered antisemitism within its ranks.

“What you have been through can never be undone. Apologies alone cannot make it right,” he added.

“I don’t see today’s announcement as the end of the road. I see it as a signpost that we are heading in the right direction.”

Mr Corbyn was suspended as a Labour MP by Sir Keir for saying, in his response to the EHRC report, that the scale of antisemitism within Labour had been “overstated” by his opponents.

The former leader was readmitted to the party after he said concerns about antisemitism had been neither “exaggerated nor overstated” but he remains barred from representing Labour in Parliament.

In December, Sir Keir said he could not “see the circumstances” under which Mr Corbyn could stand as the party’s candidate at the next election.