Right-wing Redbridge council leader who ousted Tarry as new parliamentary candidate for Ilford South was the subject of ‘serious’ sexual harassment allegations – and was reinstated by Starmer-run party against the recommendation of independent legal adviser on sexual abuse and harassment, say Labour insiders
Last night, Skwawkbox reported that Ilford South MP Sam Tarry had been deselected by the Labour party in a ballot to which some of his supporters were denied access and in which around 600 of the 860 votes cast were postal votes. Tarry lost 459-361. Labour admitted that the trigger process to decide whether there would be a selection contest at all had seen fraudulent votes cast, but the party took no action.
But in the candidate who displaced him, local council leader Jas Athwal, stood against Tarry in the seat’s 2019 parliamentary selection – until he was suspended at the last moment after a complaint involving unspecified ‘serious’ allegations.
Athwal’s right-wing supporters in Parliament reacted with outrage and claimed that the accusations were a stitch-up to prevent Athwal’s selection – but news broke that the allegations concerned ‘serious’ sexual harassment.
Despite the nature of the allegations, Athwal’s allies on the council continued to support him – and in autumn 2020 – five months after Keir Starmer became Labour leader – the party dropped the case, with a right-dominated panel of National Executive Committee (NEC) members ruling that the party’s investigative unit (GLU) had not presented enough evidence. Allies such as right-wing neighbouring MP Wes Streeting claimed that Athwal had been ‘exonerated’.
But Skwawkbox can reveal that, according to party insiders, the barrister that the party brought in for the case to act as an independent legal adviser on sexual harassment, abuse and assault recommended that Athwal should face further disciplinary process over the complaints.
One told Skwawkbox:
Once Keir Starmer took over, the allegation of serious sexual assault disappeared.
Earlier this year, Starmer’s party was shown to have asked female former staffers to sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) to silence their complaints of sexual harassment by male staff members – while serious complaints of bullying and harassment against at least one well-known right-wing ‘troll’ were ‘disappeared’ just before he was welcomed back to Labour by a right-wing NEC member – and of course the recent Al Jazeera ‘Labour Files’ documentary series revealed a ‘shocking’ litany of abuse, racism and rigging by Labour right-wingers.
Now a newly-selected parliamentary candidate’s reinstatement to the party, presented by his allies as exoneration, is said to have involved a decision by party right-wingers to ignore expert legal advice, from the barrister they appointed for the case, that action against him should continue.
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A reminder to all…thanks to Keir Starmer, the Labour Party no longer exists. In its place is the Second Conservative Party and that party is officially pledged to no major changes in anything the government does. Not only will no one but the wealthy celebrate a Starmer victory, nobody else will NOTICE it.
We all know none of his hateful, bullying, vindictive ugliness was necessary, and none of the people he has punished or driven away did anything to deserve it. Not only that, nobody out in the wider public was demanding that any of the ugliness take place.
There was no good reason for Keir to make voting for a party led by him into a vote for tragedy, a vote to kill all hopes and dreams of anything other than what is.
I distinctly remember when keef said the failure to prosecute savile should be a watershed moment …
And here’s yet another sex case/complaint, years down the line, where keef did piss-all. 😙🎶
Toffee….Keef failed to prosecute Savile, just like he failed to prosecute Cyril Smith and all the other Establishment paedos. He protects all his friends, that much is clear.
I was living in Leeds in the 1960s.
Savile’s antics were well-known then.
I was actually warned by a well-meaning friend – “Don’t, in any circumstances, get into a car with that man”
Nothing was done.
Regarding Cyril Smith – He was the “Chairman of the Board of Governers” of the Rochdale Secondary Technical School, where I did my secondary education.
Smith was well-known for years as a paedo.
The police were informed and looked the other way.
He was a local political big-wig.
But – One more thing …… The “F” word.
Leeds, Rochdale and Redbridge: only two of these serious sexual crimes locations seem to implicate a certain Rt Hon Member for the Trilateral Commission (although I’m sure he’d have helped Cyril Smith too if he’d been able).
Hopefully the torys and the libs will have plenty of ammunition to blow the labour party away.Looking at the track performance of this new candiate who I wouldnt trust with dougs 🐕…dog
The people deserve better than this car crash labour party and certainly this car crash government……I still find it difficult to believe that the countrys currency sterling is treated like a banana republic currency.1.09today thanks to early trading on the Asian market who are not as pannick stricken by mis OLeary \truss and kwasi with a fringe on top.?
Johnsco1, in the days when Ch4 did great investigations they did a programme on Smith. They interviewed numerous ex coppers who said they were disgusted that every time they picked Smith up for abuse they were told to leave him alone because he ‘knew’ things about Establishment figures.
Smith liked to abuse young 5 yr old orphan boys, specifically because nobody cared if they were abused. They even interviewed some of the abused kids who were then adults. It was a harrowing but brilliant programme. Just recently at the IICSA inquiry, an under oath David Steele admitted he was told by Smith that all the allegations about him {Smith} were true. Steele knew and did nothing about it other than put Smith up for a knighthood.
‘Other things”? He know which other powerful people were paedos as well. Secret services, the CIA, MI5/MI6. This is how they work: the health emergency scam or weapons of mass destruction; this is how they take root.
It makes me wonder what “dirt” they have on the numerous Chief Execs of the NHS, the marketing brand that holds a budget of over 120,000,000,000 per annum, that makes them impose a hideously dangerous and unscientific c*v*id Narrative and the relentless privatisation of every task it undertakes. (of course, they could each be ‘willing accomplices’ like Sir Keir Starmer).
The police were informed and looked the other way.
And so was (baron) david steel…😗🎵
The Channel 4 expose on Smith was years too late.
Even they never mentioned the “F” word.
The recent Royal pantomime was an (unintended) parade of the great and the good …. all there dispaying their establishment medals …. Orders of the Garter …. Most Honourable Orders of the Bath ….Knights of the Realm.
What a display of the institutional corruption that is the British State !!
“F” word: It’s not the obvious, johnsco1? How does Felixstowe get involved – lol?
Please, drop a hint.
I was the resident ‘front bar’ DJ @ the ‘new’ Cavern Club during the ’70s & even then there was alot of talk about Jimmy Saville & Cyril Smith & not just post gig talk among musicians, but the police who always enjoyed a late night slurp.
CONGRATULATIONS ZARA
Zarah Sultana MP
@zarahsultana
The final results have just been confirmed and I am proud to say I have been unanimously reselected as the Labour MP for Coventry South.
https://twitter.com/zarahsultana/status/1579894783375724544
your approbation does you proud steveh. (Careful tho’, you might develop a taste for supporting the underdog😀). Thanks for expressing your support. I for one am pleased you have. GREAT news, isn’t it?
I wonder why Ilford South didn’t support its incumbent?
qwertboi – Underdog, is that really how you see her?
I have never considered Zara to be anyone’s underdog, she is very obviously an extremely capable person.
As for Tarry, he obviously wasn’t well liked by the majority of Labour members in his constituency. You’ll have to ask them why. It will be interesting to see whether he makes the short list if he applies to be the PPC in other constituencies.
No, I don’t see her as an “underdog”. It was an allusion to the ‘new management’s’ imperious attitude. Tarry is an unknown entity to me, so I can’t comment on his popularity, or lack thereof.
But Evans and Starmer make sure thew suspicion of vote rigging or falsifying never leaves my mind. People like them are never what they claim..
qwertboi – Time will tell
“It will be interesting to see whether he makes the short list if he applies to be the PPC in other constituencies.”
If he’s not the PPC for Ilford South, it’s probably because Starmer & Evans made it so. Vote rigging aside, they’ve decided they don’t want him (or his ilk) as a Labour MP., hence his stage-managed sacking The Labour Right is nothing if not predictable, so vote rigging is probably not an ‘aside’, is it?
Corrupt is as corrupt does. No doubt Sam Tarry’s assessing options, but a Starmer labor party should not be associated with any of them.
qwertboi – Or maybe, it’s just democracy.
Sam Tarry engineered his own sacking.
Why don’t you email Tarry and offer him the benefit of your expertise.
The “F” word ……. “Freemason”
I used to see Smith regularly in his role as Chairman of the School Governors.
The only other time I ever saw him was at the Freemasons’ Christmas dinner at the Rochdale Masonic Hall, where his snout was in the trough with the rest of them.
What was I doing there ?
The Technical School had been invited to perform at this gathering of the great and the good.
I was a member of the choir.
Freemasonry was a powerful force in the politics and the establishment of Rochdale and surrounding towns.
As a Catholic councillor friend of mine once uttered with a tone of resignation …
“All of the important issues are carved up in the Lodges prior to committee and council meetings”.