LABOUR has kicked activist Jackie Walker out of the party today 3 years after she was first suspended for alleged anti-Semitism.
The ex-Momentum vice chair made several controversial comments including that she had not found a definition of anti-Semitism she could work with, and questioned Holocaust Memorial Day.
After the comments she made at an event at the party’s conference in 2016, Ms Walker was last suspended from the party, and her case has been under review by party officials since then.
Ms Walker was previously suspended then readmitted earlier in 2016 for comments when she said Jewish people were the “chief financiers of the sugar and slave trade”, but was stripped of her Momentum position.
A three-person panel from Labour’s National Constitutional Committee found today she had breached party rules and would now be expelled.
The case against her included several comments she had made over time – including on social media.
Dozens of her activists and allies turned out yesterday to back her at the Labour hearing.
Ms Walker also starred in a play called ‘The Lynching’ at the party’s conference, and promoted a film about her experience.
Ex-Mayor of London Ken Livingstone and MP Chris Williamson both have defended Ms Walker.
The MP for Derby North was himself suspended after he made comments where he said the party was being “too apologetic” about anti-Semitism in its ranks.
Ms Walker tried to delay her hearing date repeatedly.
A Labour Party spokesperson said today: “The National Constitutional Committee has found that the charges of breaches of Party rules by Jackie Walker have been proven.
“The National Constitutional Committee consequently determined that the sanction for this breach of the rules is expulsion from Labour Party membership.”
Jewish Labour MP Dame Margaret Hodge said: “The expulsion of Jackie Walker today is welcomed. But it should not have taken well over two years for the party to get here.
“This is not what an efficient or effective complaints system looks like.”
Yesterday Ms Walker said she walked out of the hearing when they “refused to allow her to make a short opening statement in her defence” at the start of the hearing.
But a Labour spokesperson rejected her claims, and added: “Jackie Walker has made a number of incorrect and misleading claims about this process.
“The procedures ensure due process and fair hearing, including the opportunity for individuals to fully state their case at their hearing.
“The process is the same for everyone and the order of the events is clearly explained to those involved in advance.”
Joe Glasman, Head of Political and Government Investigations at Campaign Against Antisemitism, said today: “It comes as no surprise that the institutionally antisemitic Labour Party waited almost three years to finally expel Jackie Walker. During those three years she has toured the nation, openly supported by leading Labour MPs, claiming that the case against her was trumped up.
“It is because Labour has shown itself to be incapable of addressing antisemitism cases in a fair, transparent and timely manner that Campaign Against Antisemitism brought in the Equality and Human Right’s Commission to take charge.
“Labour’s decision to finally act now that the Commission is at the gate, is not a sign of change, but merely an act of naked self-preservation by a political party being brought face-to-face with its own racism.”
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