love* in the time of plague (and by love* i mean brexit* and other dreary matters of uk politics)

rampant violent antiblackness and islamophobia in every party, media outlet, social/political institution needs to be rooted out yesterday but clearly hardly anyone who isn't directly affected gives a shit

even mr fucking lifelong antiracist was like more cops, kinder gentler deportations

Trying to locate the thread of melts that CP is discussing - Twitter or FB? On Twitter there are a lot of the worst people being uncharacteristically quiet.

It's a FB thing suzy and probably best left there, think I'd alluded to it earlier on yesterday.

Waking up slightly soberer this morning and asking myself what the point of political engagement is when the Labour Party is apparently poisoned well beyond use.

Am I FB friends with the thread instigator, though? I want to have a look...

Hang on I'll message you

One of the worst things I’ve read in this report was in the case of the member who was reported for making such vile antisemitic comments that they were eventually reported to counter terrorism police and successfully prosecuted. But before that, the disputes team sat on the case and did nothing before an audit of the outstanding cases was done.

McNicol's team were doing nothing, wow pic.twitter.com/k09kBR86Do

— Hadley Freeman-on-the-land (@wariotifo) April 12, 2020

A welcome reminder that some of the new intake in 2019 are good.

The membership and movement have been shafted. Justice must now prevail and be enacted immediately.

— lan Byrne MP (@IanByrneMP) April 13, 2020

Btw if I was Starmer (as regular readers of this thread will know i am recently ousted vampire John Rentoul MR Seumas Milne) id be looking at this and planning a clearout. If the wreckers went after Burnham and Corbyn, he’s on borrowed time too.

I've been wondering about the timing of the leak. Perhaps the report itself wasn't written in time but the WhatsApp messages have apparently been sat on for a long time. The decision to leak them now rather than during the leadership campaign - when they would presumably have benefited RLB - suggests that the aim is to prevent Starmer from hiring any of them. And none of these people should be allowed anywhere near a position of power ever again.

Leaving aside the racism, the craven self interest, the fact that people have died as a result of this pointlessly destructive game-playing, it's just as astonishing piece of dumbfuckery. Obviously Westminster is stuffed to the rafters with people who think they're in The Thick of It but why would you write that shit down in the first place?

There were rumours circulating that Oldknow was slated to replace Formby as General Secretary. That clearly can’t happen now.

Setting up a secret WhatsApp group so you can look like you're working while slagging off everyone else in the office is the sort of thing you associate with 22 year olds straight out of university and most of them are smart enough to know that shit blows up in your face. But apparently galaxy brained masters of spin haven't worked that out.

Yeah the timing is strange, but the date on the report is probably why. There’s talk of James Schneider being involved, but I don’t know what proof there is of that. There was a particularly painful part of the report that mentioned him and so I can’t say I’d blame him in his circs.

BBC running a rolling hagiography of one of the nurses involved in Johnson's care, totally normal public interest story, nothing to see here.

The thing most of these cunts haven’t worked out is that their wrecking damages the party for the public, not just the faction they’re opposed to. If it were me, I’d do the job and hang on for my chance, because a party in power is always worth so much more than one in opposition. But the kind of petty shit you see in the messages clearly perpetuated all the way up to strategic decisions.

it's politics as game/career to them isn't it? not sure why these people got involved in the Labour party in the first place but it's pretty clear their interests are no longer focused on transforming society, just on controlling as much power and patronage as they can.

If Ed Miliband and Andy Burnham were also unacceptably left wing for them then yes they will go for Starmer as well. Either they're banking on him taking a big shift to the right or they view him as a placeholder until he can be replaced by the closest thing to David Miliband or Dan Jarvis they can find.

I assume these ones joined when Labour was in government for career reasons, rather than any sort of wish to see a socialist government.

"nothing to see here"

probably exactly what the doctor said in the ICU ward after examining the PM

I think this will have totally fucked Starmer with the membership, by the way.

it's fucked the party full stop

Who the fuck would want to be in a party with a majority clique that sees Starmer as too left wing? You might as well join the Conservatives

None of these people would make it in the Conservative Party and they know that full well.

Starmer isn’t implicated. If he fails to oversee their expulsion, he will be. Ashworth’s going to be in an uncomfortable position.

Ashworth deserves to be. Starmer must have seen this report, and some of his appointments are implicated.

Another telling part of the #labourleaks is that they wanted to allow Simon Danczuk to stand as a Labour candidate despite him sending a 17-year-old girl sexually explicit text messages when she asked for a job.

— Alex Tiffin (@RespectIsVital) April 12, 2020

"None of these people would make it in the Conservative Party and they know that full well."

I'm sure when the earliest version of the Labour Party first met in that building in Bradford they were discussing the need for a party for scheming 2nd rate career politicians that lack the old money connections to cut it as a Tory!

Starmer needs to not only deal with the toady little shits involved but institute serious reforms of the party structure, not least to deal with the blatant institutional racism. don't see how they can hope to engage BAME members and potential members without this.

May 2018

Dawn Butler claimed that Jeremy Corbyn was desperate to deal with anti-semitism in the Labour Party but was blocked by Iain McNicol (the former General Secretary) pic.twitter.com/p9qUw9tZmZ

— James Cleverly (@JamesCleverly) May 5, 2018

And, less than an hour later John Ashworth said that she was talking rubbish. pic.twitter.com/MY45oQC6CK

— James Cleverly (@JamesCleverly) May 5, 2018

god I despise that Ashworth more and more every time I see him.

Karma's failure to find a shadow cabinet role for Dawn Butler looking increasingly o_O imo

Found a place for Wes Streeting though, didn’t he.

Ashworth was the guy who made an arse of himself during the election campaign, right? I'd assumed he stayed where he was because you can't really change the Shadow Health Minister during a pandemic but maybe not.

If Starmer is smart he will use this as an opportunity to position himself as a new broom but idk how that would work if he personally suppressed the report.

I'll try not to go on about the labour stuff all day, but this is beyond belief.

Sam Matthews got to go on panorama to accuse Corbyn of having done more than “any modern day political figure since the Second World War to bring about the rise of antisemitism.”

Defamation. https://t.co/Rb9D66HeTk

— Matty N (@Mattyblag) April 13, 2020

yeah Ashworth was handing gifts to the Tories and being a complete a dozy and disloyal twat during an election campaign, total arsehole.

This is how a former Blairite MP is responding to a report which shows that senior Labour officials tried to sabotage the 2017 election campaign. These people are without shame & beneath contempt. pic.twitter.com/3TZesSIOlo

— Alex Niven (@Alex_Niven) April 13, 2020

is there a good overview of this shitshow yet? apologies if already linked

T*m Bl*nkins*p is a total prick, does he even have a job now? This is all he’s done for years, day in day out on twitter. Thank God he resigned.

I think this will have totally fucked Starmer with the membership, by the way.

― gyac, Monday, 13 April 2020 bookmarkflaglink

Amazing this is as big a test for Starmer as his reaction to a pandemic but he has already been found out on that one.

Setting up a secret WhatsApp group so you can look like you're working while slagging off everyone else in the office is the sort of thing you associate with 22 year olds straight out of university

From what I remmember from the Panorama programme a lot of the people working with Sam Matthews were 22 year olds straight out of university.

Also given this has now been leaked it can't possibly be excluded from the EHRC investigation can it?

I don’t know who is and isn’t a music journo on fb but guessing we’re talking about the people who were giving it the KINDER GENTLER POLITICS EH when someone was being rude about boris last week who are now totally fine with racist & misogynist abuse & undermining attempts to deal with same as long as it helps the cause, and who incidentally have ~thoughts~ about biological sex because of course they do

Could be argued that it’s out of scope and actively undermining the party case.

I don't think the party has any say in the matter any more? The EHRC can choose to take it into account whether the Labour Party likes it or not.

Tell them.

So is Emily Oldknow seriously going to be @Keir_Starmer pick for @UKLabour General Secretary? Surely she should never be employed by the Labour Party in any capacity ever again? https://t.co/8aw0aetpS9

— Diane Abbott MP (@HackneyAbbott) April 13, 2020

Oldknow is not saying she had Tom Watson delay the expulsion of ken Livingstone in that quoted passage unless I’m reading wrong

Ellipses make it difficult to parse, but if that interpretation is wrong, there’s still tons of shit that’s appalling.

Notable how many of these people, including Blenkinsop, went directly into union roles.

Nobody says “x is saying I did y” meaning “I did y”, there is enough bad shit in there that nobody should be putting obviously wacky interpretations out as “the most damning quote”

2019 intake again

Ashamed as the former Deputy Chair of @unisontheunion National Black Members that so many of these staff demonstrating racist attitudes now working at high levels for my union. We members cannot allow this to continue @DavePrentis.

— Kim Johnson MP (@KimJohnsonMP) April 13, 2020

Ooh snr Whatsapp @UKLabour staff are on twitter! Say hi to
Patrick Heneghan @pjheneghan Greg Cook @gregcook10
Neil Fleming @theneilfleming Fiona Stanton @fionastanton Tracey Allen @SofaaSogood Julie Lawrence @julieklawrence Anna Wright @annawrightwho
John Stolliday @jstolliday pic.twitter.com/bdcSUzOBWR

— Two Flames (@msjenniferjames) April 12, 2020

SV - Yes, saw this last night.

The fact that so many of them are now in Labour-affiliated unions, does not surprise me at all. Labour unions are full to the brim with Jess Phillips types who dgaf about organised labour & are either there via posts in the LP, or because they want a future career in the LP.

— notes on sudan (@notesonsudan) April 12, 2020