Labour suspends race pioneer Trevor Phillips over Islamophobia claims

But, but, but, I’m black!!!!! But, but, but, I’m an anti-racism pioneer….!!!

Reminds me of the descriptions by survivors of the gulags of arrested communists shrieking from their cells, “But, but but, I’m a good Communist…. this must be some mistake surely.”  The biter bit, the left eats itself. 

I shouldn’t laugh because Trevor Phillips is a decent human being who is right about the grooming gangs and a few other things.

From the Times and the Daily Mail

Trevor Phillips, an anti-racism campaigner who previously chaired the Equality and Human Rights Commission, faces an investigation and could be expelled from the party.

He was among a group of 24 public figures who last year declared their refusal to vote for the Labour Party because of its association with anti-Semitism.

However, The Times reported that he is now being investigated over past comments, some of which date back years, including remarks on Pakistani Muslim men sexually abusing children in northern British towns.

. . .  the allegations cite extracts from a 2016 pamphlet Mr Phillips wrote which contained the statement, ‘The most sensitive cause of conflict in recent years has been the collision between majority norms and the behaviours of some Muslim groups. ‘In particular, the exposure of systematic and longstanding abuse by men, mostly of Pakistani Muslim origin in the north of England.’

He went on to describe attending an Islamic conference before Remembrance Sunday where only one Muslim attendee wore a poppy. (Later that day he made) a visit to an industrial site where many African and eastern European immigrants worked … noticed a marked difference in those who were planning to mark Remembrance Sunday. He wrote,  ‘Poppies were everywhere. One group had clearly adapted to the mainstream, the other had not.’

It is also thought other remarks included the issue of the sympathy shown by some in an opinion poll towards the motives of the Charlie Hebdo attackers.

However, since receiving news of the suspension Mr Phillips has penned a column for The Times on Monday in which he questions the motivation behind the sanction and accuses Labour bosses of ‘political gangsterism’.

Mr Phillips told The Times there was no suggestion that he has done anything unlawful and ‘no one inside or outside the Labour Party has ever suggested that I have broken any rules’.

A draft charge sheet cites Mr Phillips’s remarks to a Conservative Party conference fringe event. He said: “I don’t know if I’m the only one here who’s been nominated by a UN body as the Islamophobe of the Year. You might have been, Peter, no?” To laughter, Peter Tatchell, the veteran gay rights campaigner, joked: “I’m jealous!”

The draft charge sheet accuses Mr Phillips of using language “which targets or intimidates members of ethnic or religious communities, or incites racism, including Islamophobia”.

There is speculation about the motives for trying to expel him now. He has been a leading voice denouncing Labour’s antisemitism problems under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership. He is also a member of the same Holborn & St Pancras constituency Labour party in north London as Sir Keir Starmer, the favourite to win the leadership election who is suspected of having designs to move away from a hard-left agenda.

He writes – 

Readers will appreciate my perplexity. I am a person of colour, with a family heritage of Fulani and Mandinka Muslims going back 1,000 years until ripped apart by transatlantic slavery. Some of my relatives have made the return journey to embrace Islam. It also seems peculiar to make an example of someone who introduced the term “Islamophobia” to British politics by commissioning the Runnymede Trust’s 1997 report on the issue; and who then, as head of the Commission for Racial Equality, worked closely with Labour on the Racial and Religious Hatred Act 2006 that protects Muslims from incitement.

No one inside or outside the Labour Party has ever suggested that I have broken any rules. I have never been “no-platformed”. In the final week of the 2019 election campaign, I even celebrated the 40th anniversary of the Sickle Cell Society alongside one of Jeremy Corbyn’s closest allies, Dawn Butler. She has known me for decades — would she really have agreed to appear on stage with a bigot?

So what accounts for this extraordinary turn of events? Some will see it as payback by Corbynistas for public criticisms I made of the leadership’s failure to tackle antisemitism in the party. Another possibility is that it’s an attempt to scare the Equality and Human Rights Commission, which I used to lead and which is investigating Labour’s handling of antisemitism. Weaponising Islamophobia to attack political opponents may seem like clever tactics but trying to intimidate a legally independent organisation is pure political gangsterism. Perhaps someone in Labour HQ has been reading up on the Inquisition’s methods; in 1578, one official defined its purpose thus: “That others may become terrified and weaned away from the evils they would commit.”

I accept that I may not share all the views of Labour’s current leader or even of the majority of members. But I have never belonged to any other party and I have stuck by it through thick and thin. If this is how Labour treats its own family, how might it treat its real opponents if it ever gains power again?

Indeed – think very carefully before you vote.