Outrage at Labour’s imposition in Ealing borough elections – John Martin’s social media comments about GRT ‘invasions’ condemned and questions raised about how ‘new’ member with record of siding with Tories to harangue Labour councillors could be considered, let alone forced on locals
The Labour party’s selection process for council election candidates in the London Borough of Ealing, like many in London and elsewhere, has been tightly controlled by the right-wing regime. In Ealing Southall, 100% of candidates have been imposed in the twenty-two seats to be contest in May.
And in Norwood Green, a predominantly Asian ward, the imposition of white male estate agent John Martin has caused outrage among Labour members.
Martin was well known to Ealing members – not as a Labour activist but as an associate of former Tory councillors in the borough’s Cleveland ward where his business is based. One Cleveland member told Skwawkbox that Mr Martin “regularly turned up at ward forums and simply ‘harangued’ Labour councillors” in unison with the local Tories.
Martin is thought to be a very recent convert to the Labour Party. As such he has none of the history of campaigning for Labour, or of trade union activity, that would usually be demanded of any would-be candidate at any level – yet he has been handed a safe seat in Southall.
Members have described his candidacy as ‘sickening’ because of his attacks on the Gypsy/Roma/Traveller (GRT) community in Norwood Green, where is he wants to be elected as a councillor. Martin has repeatedly used the hashtag #traveller invasion to describe an encampment in the ward and tweeted calling for a ‘#permanentsolution’:
This language has been condemned as an echo of the holocaust language of a ‘final solution’. Some half a million GRT people died in the holocaust and the community continues to face extreme discrimination today, with activists describing it as the ‘last acceptable form of racism’ and speaking movingly of its impact on them, their families and their mental health.
And that racism is widespread among the Labour right. Former Labour MP John Mann published a booklet that included GRT people in a list of antisocial behaviour. More recently, Labour MP and then-frontbencher Charlotte Nichols tweeted a picture of herself handing out leaflets about ‘traveller incursions’, then claimed she hadn’t known what ‘incursion’ means; right-wing Labour front-bencher Toby Perkins posted anti-traveller comments on his website. Neither was disciplined by Keir Starmer.
Mr Martin’s comments about GRT people are not limited to a single tweet. At least three others have been captured by opponents of his selection:
Ealing Labour Women members raised Martin’s candidacy with deputy Ealing Council leader and Vice Chair of the LP Irish Society, Deidre Costigan, but said that Costigan refused to condemn his comments. Local election applicants in Ealing were presented with entire dossiers of their social media going back ten years by chief whip Gareth Shaw. Despite his more recent record, John Martin was embraced and imposed by the party.
Skwawkbox wrote to John Martin at his business email, asking:
Mr Martin,
I’ve received a number of complaints from local members about your selection as a local government candidate. Principal among the issues seem to be your length of time as a member, your Conservative background, your imposition in a ward of mainly minority residents and especially your comments about Gypsy/Roma/Traveller (GRT) people.
I will be covering these complaints on Monday evening so please advise no later than 5pm (for the avoidance of doubt that’s tomorrow, 14 Feb):
– in your view, was it appropriate for Labour to impose a white candidate in a predominantly Asian ward?
– according to local Labour members, you were well-known as a supporter of former Tory councillors in Cleveland ward where your business is based and have been known to turn up at ward forums and ‘harangue’ Labour councillors together with local Tories. Do you dispute this?
– members say that you have only recently joined the party and therefore have no track record of campaigning or of union activity as would usually be expected of an applicant, let alone a successful one. Is this true?
– members appear to be deeply angry about your selection given comments you have made about the GRT community, with one even using the word ‘sickening’ to describe it. You asked on social media for a ‘permanent solution’ to solve what you called a ‘traveller invasion’, which has been compared to nazi ‘final solution’ language used about Jewish people. Hundreds of thousands of GRT people were killed in the Holocaust and their community faces extensive discrimination today. Do you think such language makes you an appropriate candidate?
– potential council candidates in Ealing were presented with dossiers of their social media going back 10 years by chief whip Gareth Shaw. Did the party raise your social media comments before selecting you?
At the time of writing, no reply had been received.
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Labour Party sadly is not democratic, nor socialist anymore. It is morphing into a neofascist outfit with right wing people in it that use language very much reminiscent of fascists.
……… Sabine Ebert Forbes And another person like Maria who have seen how easily ordinary people can drift into fascism like Germany and Spain before the war and dont have to be dyed in the wool fascists to support a fascist party and dictators…This type of behaviour right wing politics morphs as the Labour party have into a fascist dictatorship
.Sabine its amazing how Bolton wanderers have morphed into a team worth watching.nowadays and I can only hope that I will one day be allowed to fly over and see my adopted Bolton town and football club before I die.despite the “trotters” being in Horwich on the on breathtakingly beautiful.. west pennine moors.and not the railway end I used to stand in as a kid at burnden park.Strange that I should reminise about a dirty industrial mill town that used to have belching chimneys and never ending back streets…but I suppose that’s why I was amazed that people across Britain would be interested in the lives of people in coronation street and its people when Granada tv trialed it as life in a mill town in Lancashire.?
Bolton are doing great. I used to hold a season ticket, but work at the time have made that too expensive. But I still follow Bolton. Presently looking to replace my BWFC hood which I git in 1997, as it is falling to pieces, and the zip only functions because of a safety pin ……
‘ordinary people can drift into fascism like Germany and Spain before the war…’
I’d argue that the Top/Down ‘centrists’ (and behavioural psychologists) know this. Every time people are scared, the majority – and especially the ‘non-political’ – move hard rightwards.
After capitalism’s hemorrhage which the billionaires’ synchronised-MSM down-played as a “banking crisis”, every election produced markedly right wing governments. Britain, France, Turkey, Thailand, India, Brazil. It was a global phenomenon. Why do you think the 99.8% suvival rate covid narrative scam is being promoted by the Powers that Be (PtB) and their MSM so unnecessarily?
Be afraid, be very afraid – for then, ‘we can control you better’.
Old people drift right quite naturally, my own family have lost the plot big time, its beyond comprehension
The debt that has been created by Boomers can never be paid
True story at WMC AGM, Secretary stands up and says ‘we have a £10,000 deficit, what do you think we should do’
Hand goes up and Geordie says ‘why don’t we give it to charity’
Can someone explain to SteveH what a deficit is
Doug – Oh dear, are you too embarrassed to ask for yourself.
Doug please not all us old gits go right. Some of us stay socialists true to our ideology taught to us by our socialist parents that didn’t impose there beliefs just explained them and then let us choose. But were secretly very happy that we choose to care and support the weakest in society from right wing scum exploiters usually Tory scum.
Not as a disabled middle aged socialist I see how this country has treated disabled people first hand and I remember the vile reaction we had from New Labour imposing the degusting ESA and crappata BS testing on us yes I was disabled at 32 20 ahem something years ago thanks to a idiot in a white van!
So please don’t label us older socialists with any thing right label I waked away from my beloved Labour party when Stammer was elected that same day in fact and was bitter for a long time! Now I see Labour destroying it self maybe from the wreckage something can be rebuilt possibly but the right wing must all be removed if that happens.
Until that point I will support a real socialist party like PAL and make damn sure there is never any right wing involvement big tent BS fell for that one once never again!!! A socialist only party for me thanks I won’t vote Tory, or even Tory lite despite living in East Sussex solid Tory Land.
@disabledgrandad I bet pretty much every democratic socialist could agee with PAL (People’s Alliance of the Left) and its Memorandum of Understanding. Thelma Walker’s initiative already has the backing of Left Unity and could quickly become a key embryonic player in the move to develop a successor to the once great former ‘People’s Party’.
Thanks dd – and, you’re right, plenty of older socialist are, like JC himself, committed to democratic socialism after a long life fof diasppointment from a top-down Labour Party held back by a fabian mindset.
qwertboi – The last time Thelma Walker stood for election as an MP she got all of 250 votes, Signs of things to come?
Is the party grasping at straws? Regardless of whether they are fit enough to stand as a candidate it doesn’t seem to matter.
The imposition of the likes of Martin proves how low the party has become. As long as they don’t represent, or have any kind of left thinking anyones welcome.
Back and beyond.IT all comes down to “political education” which used to play a big part in the old Labour party and that in itself would have stopped fascists like Starmer or numptys with no political background being parachuted in.and killing off the Labour party..We also liked to “educate” the membership whom I blame for voting in the most obvious “establishment stooge” who was allowed to start a witchunt and a demolition job in the Labour party.
Political education “allowed even the poorly educated like myself to become motivated for a better life and freedoms for the working-class people whom I am constantly told dont exist.They may not in the new Labour party but they certainly do when the government tells them to shoulder the burden of the corrupt Tory wide boys asset stripping and incompetenc and the Labour party backs them up in dismantling the legacy of a Labour government that actually attempted to provide a country with a welfare state for retuning weary soldiers who fought a war against fascism or so they thought.for the benefit of their children and grandchildren..Seventy years ago and a fascist dictator in a fascist Labour party help to destroy everything good about Britain and the welfare state.and supports the conservative and unionist party in just about everthing and even outshines in Ireland and palastine by supporting partition” and the apartheid regime in Israel..
Holocaust Language and “show-me-your-papers” covid authoritarianism: WEF-endorsed member of The Trilateral Commission, Keir Rodney Starmer must NEVER become Prime Minister of Great Britain.
It is more than the Labour party at stake.
On the subject of candidate selection – any news of the trigger ballot in your neck of the woods?
My MP wrongly wrote to me as a former member of the party asking me to vote for his re-adoption in the trigger ballot process. I’m checking with left members and former members to learn what the dynamics of the choice are perceived to be. Other than that, I don’t now much goldbach.
Thank God for people like you quertboi who are able to realise just how ruthless and dangerous this man is to not just politics but the working-class people of Britain and my country Ireland.,I will say that theres plenty in Dublin,Cork and Derry who realise just how dangerous to the people of.Ireland this coward is but for the moment they watch with rising concern.
.I see like most cowards who attack the most vulnerable in society hes bleating about extra security. for himself and family.before any real threat as been established..Does he think the elderly or disabled will mob him?
…He would be better looking at his past crimes as Boss of the DPP than fingering so called extremists in politics.who just want him to go away and give peace a chance.and do his job as Leader of the opposition.,not bloody mossad.or the Tory party.
Starmer has got to be working for MI5
Martin, a new right conservative with dubious racial veiws, perfect for New New Labour.
In Starmers Labour all are welcome as long as they are not Socialists or antiZionists and as long as they are willing to back Starmer no matter what.
When Starmer’s labour publicly welcomed the foul mouthed Tory Christian Wakeford into the fold is it any surprise that the racist, Tory supporting John Martin is deemed to be suitable to represent Starmer’s Labour as a Councillor?
He and Wakeford will feel right at home in Starmer’s Labour with the equally foul mouthed Jess Phillips and nasty racist Neil Coyle ( he’ll be back on the Labour benches once he “recovers” from the “mental Health ” and “alcohol” problems which we are expected caused his disgusting behaviour),and all the other two faced, greedy, back biting “labour” MPs and Councillors who use the party as a platform for the gravy train.
Passed on exes no doubt. Either that or it’s nostril abuse. What a shower.
Dear ‘Martin the Moron’ (?)
Just to politically educate you.
One of the first things the Tory and Lib Dem Coalition did in 2010 (as part of Austerity) was to cut £26m from the Annual Gypsies & Travellers National Sites Fund so that’s £312m cut to date.
Now the Tories blame the victims of their policy cut via a grotesque clause in the draconian Police Bill and sadly it seem some fall for Tory propaganda?
I think we should stand by these oppressed citizens.
Diverse Working People of the World Unite!
Just a reminder, the ENTIRE Labour Movement is not with Starmer and his right-wing clique (which will survive in Labour much longer than he will), Train drivers’ union Aslef to discuss disaffiliating from Labour at upcoming conference
Qwertboi not sure socialists will return to Labour the right wing cancer is still there and will alwase be there I suggest personally PAL or one of the other socialist only parties. Getting shot of Starmer will still have what 95% of the PLP and most of the backroom staff are all solid right wing and that’s the issue!
Labour I feel is doomed I hate to see it go but I feel it has to die before a real socialist party can slowly rebuild I know the usual but it will be so slow with 1 or 2 MP’s at first but honestly how many real socialist are left in Labour 3 or 4 tops the rest useless appeasers who forget there ideology as soon as there elected and only remember it when the next election comes around.
No matter what happens with the leadership Labour under Starmer is going to loose huge next election he may think he is all so cleaver kicking out the socialists but they were the real kingmakers not the useless Tory-lite centrists. For them I ask this simple question if the centre is so electable according to you. Then why didn’t the LIBDIMS the centrists don’t forget never become a huge party and get themselves in charge and has to slime up to the Torys to form a sick government hummmm?
Clearly not interested in resolving the issue–only cynically exploiting it.