The Starmer regime has expelled yet another Jewish member – and another former elected officer. Stephen Marks, a left-wing member of Labour’s National Constitutional Committee until he was suspended by the right – a standard factional tactic to ‘nobble’ officials elected by members – has been kicked out of the party for signing petitions.

According to Jewish Voice for Labour, Marks was expelled for signing petitions calling for the end of the use of antisemitism as a smear – a phenomenon already recognised, no doubt to Keir Starmer’s unending frustration, by the QC-led Forde Inquiry he reluctantly commissioned. Labour did not even bother responding to Marks’s challenge to the party’s pretext for suspending him.

According to Jewish Voice for Labour (JVL), Marks:

wrote to the Party challenging the grounds for his suspension, but never received a response to that or subsequent attempts at communication.

Until last week, 19th December 2022, when he received a notice of summary expulsion.

Bindmans has written a letter on his behalf to the EHRC which is monitoring Labour’s implementation of its Action Plan against Antisemitism challenging the entire procedure.

They point out that

• all actions pre-dated Stephen’s election to the NCC
• he was one of a large number of signatories to these public documents and that other signatories have not been investigated by the Labour Party
• the charge of undermining the Labour Party’s campaign against racism, which in view of Stephen’s strong anti-racist actions and beliefs, is in fact an example of the Labour Party conflating legitimate criticisms of the Israeli government (expression of which is protected by Article 10 EHRC) with antisemitism.

It goes on to cite words written by Stephen in response to the charges:

“There is a principle of natural justice here, the right to speak up for others subject to accusations which is relevant to all three petitions. I have confirmed with other NCC colleagues that a signature on a statement or petition would not normally be accepted as evidence in a disciplinary case, being merely an expression of legitimate opinion, unless the petition itself contained racist or sexist expressions. Also it is illegitimate not to show ALL signatories as this representation singles me out.”

You can read the full letter here.

Marks is at least the third Jewish member – and the second elected by members at a national level – expelled by Labour in just the last couple of weeks, during the Jewish festival of Hannukah, preceded by National Executive member Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi and Heather Mendick on similarly trumped-up ‘charges’.

Wimborne-Idrissi wrote of Marks’s expulsion:

There is clearly ‘no room in the inn Keir Starmer’s party’ for ‘the wrong type of Jew’ as the deeply-racist right-wing regime continues to reveal its real nature.

 

---