Dominic Raab clashed with a senior Labour politician in a tense exchange about anti-Semitism in the Labour Party following last night’s heated BBC debate in which Jeremy Corbyn was again challenged over his tackling of the crisis.
The foreign secretary faced up to shadow transport secretary Andy McDonald after the pair conducted a short interview with Sky News following the Question Time special in Sheffield.
Mr Raab and Mr McDonald pointed at each other in an animated manner during the quarrel, as the Tory noted that only Labour and the BNP have ever been investigated by the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
The EHRC launched an investigation into anti-Semitism in Labour in August ‘after receiving a number of complaints about allegations’.
Last night’s confrontation turned bitter when Mr McDonald challenged Mr Raab about the Tories’ failure to hold an inquiry into Islamophobia.
It came after Mr Corbyn was grilled on Question Time by one audience member who said he was ‘terrified’ for his daughters’ future after seeing the way the Labour leader treated his female Jewish MPs.
Dominic Raab (left) faced up to shadow transport secretary Andy McDonald (right) after the pair conducted a short interview with Sky News about the leaders’ Question Time debate
The confrontation between Mr Raab and Mr McDonald came after Mr Corbyn (right, in Sheffield today) was grilled by one audience member who said he was ‘terrified’ for his daughters’ future after seeing the way the Labour leader treated his female Jewish MPs. Left: Boris Johnson and his father Stanley today
Ryan Jacobs said he had watched a video of Labour MP Ruth Smeeth running out of a press conference in tears after being heckled by activist Marc Wadsworth in 2016.
At the event, at which Mr Corbyn launched Baroness Chakrabarti’s much-derided report into the party’s anti-Semitism problem, the leader was later seen chatting to Mr Wadsworth.
Mr Jacobs said what he had seen on the video meant he could not buy Mr Corbyn’s ‘nice old grandpa’ act.
The 36-year-old from Hull also took the Labour leader to task over the fact former Labour MP Luciana Berger needed a bodyguard at the party’s conference last year.
Ryan Jacobs, 36, from Hull, dismissed Mr Corbyn’s ‘nice old grandpa’ image
During his spat with the foreign secretary, Mr McDonald said in front of shocked onlookers: ‘You’re actually putting it into the long grass, you’re refusing to do it… listen to Baroness Warsi, she’s telling you what to do about it. You should be doing it.’
But Mr Raab hit back: ‘Two parties in this country’s history have been investigated by the Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) – Labour under Corbyn and the BNP (British National Party).
‘Answer that.’
The visibly frustrated Mr Raab then walked away.
Later on BBC Newsnight Mr McDonald said Labour is ‘happy’ to be subject to an inquiry into anti-Semitism because its efforts to tackle the issue could be ‘externally validated’.
Mr McDonald added: ‘We’re happy that EHRC are looking into these matters because if they can look at our processes and find any room for improvement then we want to hear from them.
‘We think we’ve taken many steps including the doubling of staff, the appointing of internal counsel, and speeding up the processing of complaints.
‘So we’ve done an awful lot about this but we are very happy to have that externally validated and looked into by the Equality and Human Rights Commission, and really that’s why we set it up in the first instance so they could carry out these functions.’
Asked if Labour could have envisaged being investigated by the commission it set up in 2007, he said it ‘should have no barriers to where it looks’ and suggested it should look into Islamophobia complaints in the Tory party.
He added: ‘Hopefully the Conservative Party will take the warnings from Baroness Warsi and set up their inquiry into Islamophobia and if necessary the EHRC may want to look there as well.
‘It’s critically important that we remove all forms of prejudice out of political life and wider society.’
Baroness Sayeeda Warsi has been vocal in calling for an inquiry into apparent anti-Muslim bigotry within the Conservative Party.
She recently tweeted the decision not to hold an inquiry into the specific issue was ‘disappointing’ and ‘predictable’.
Mr Corbyn faced a brutal onslaught from the audience on Question Time last night as he desperately struggled to convince voters he is fit to be prime minister.
The Labour leader looked shocked as he was booed on the flagship BBC show when he tried to explain his party’s convoluted position on Brexit.
For the first time Mr Corbyn made clear the public will never know whether he personally wants to Leave or Remain – admitting he intends to stay ‘neutral’ in a second referendum rather than backing the new package he wants to negotiate with the EU.
In his own grilling on the same programme later, Boris Johnson expressed incredulity that Labour was ‘indifferent’ on the biggest decision facing the country.
During a devastating 30-minute mauling, Mr Corbyn reeled as he was confronted by more voters over ‘misogynism’ and anti-Semitism in the Labour Party.
The veteran was also asked whether business should be ‘frightened’ of a left-wing government, as Tom Gray, a 25-year-old housing officer from Rotherham, said: ‘Your reckless socialist ideas are genuinely terrifying for me and my family.’
He was challenged over whether he would bow to Nicola Sturgeon’s demand for another Scottish independence referendum – which she has warned would be a red line for propping him up in power if there is a hung Parliament.
He eventually muttered that a new ballot should not take place ‘in the early part of the new Parliament’, but made clear it would happen.
He also floundered as he defended the party’s pledge to nationalise chunks of BT and offer free broadband to everyone in the country – which experts say would cost £100billion.
He initially claimed South Korea had a similar system and everyone received free broadband, before admitting that many people there still paid for the service.
Mr Corbyn is desperately trying to overhaul the Tory advantage in the polls, which has been running at up to 17 points and consistently in double figures.
Northern heartlands desert Jeremy : Brexit revolt in traditional Labour seats could hand victory to Boris Johnson as poll shows PM is on course to breach ‘Red Wall’
by Simon Walters for the Daily Mail
A revolt by Labour voters in the North and Midlands against Jeremy Corbyn‘s bid to block Brexit could hand Boris Johnson victory in next month’s General Election.
The Tories are on course to win about 30 seats in Labour’s English heartlands on December 12 thanks to a dramatic swing against Mr Corbyn’s party since the 2017 election, according to a Daily Mail poll.
It means the Conservatives are poised to triumph in working-class seats they have rarely – if ever – held, such as Bishop Auckland, Great Grimsby, Rother Valley, Stoke-on-Trent North, Workington and Bassetlaw. All are in areas which voted to leave the EU.
The Survation poll for the Daily Mail shows that large parts of the north of England could return their first Conservative MP in generations
The Survation poll, carried out after Mr Corbyn unveiled his controversial £83 billion manifesto, suggests Labour has been overwhelmingly rejected by its traditional supporters. It is the first election opinion poll this year to focus on the North and Midlands.
Remarkably, the poll also found that four in ten Labour voters (39 per cent) would be more likely to vote Labour if the party got rid of Mr Corbyn. And one in four Labour voters (23 per cent) prefer Mr Johnson’s Brexit policy.
The findings indicate that Mr Corbyn’s so-called ‘Red Wall’ of seats from North Wales to Durham will be breached by the Tories.
Labour support in the vast region has slumped by 11 points to 37 per cent since the 2017 election. The Tories are on 42 per cent – down two points since 2017. The Lib Dems are on 13 per cent, up from 5 per cent in 2017, with the Brexit Party on 7 per cent.
Mr Corbyn is paying a heavy price for his EU fence-sitting – 9 per cent of those who backed him in 2017 have defected to the pro-Brexit Tories; another 11 per cent have defected to Jo Swinson’s anti-Brexit Lib Dems.
The biggest Labour-Tory swing is in the North West, including Manchester and Liverpool, where Labour had a mammoth 19-point lead over the Conservatives in 2017. That has been slashed to just two points.
The Tory lead over Labour in the East Midlands has soared from ten points in 2017 to 18 points. And the Conservatives have slashed Labour’s lead in Yorkshire and The Humber region by nine points, putting them one point behind.
Crucially, the Conservatives have leads of up to 20 percentage points in 43 Labour-held seats they are targeting in the North and Midlands. Mr Johnson needs a swing of just 5 per cent to gain 16 Labour seats, including Wakefield, Keighley, Barrow, Dudley North and Newcastle-under-Lyme.
A swing of 10 per cent would see another 14 go from red to blue, including Bassetlaw, Dewsbury, Bolton North East and Darlington. A 15 per cent swing would see another 12 Labour seats captured by Mr Johnson, including the former pit village of Bolsover in Derbyshire, held by veteran Labour MP Dennis Skinner, and Tony Blair’s old constituency, Sedgefield in County Durham.
Damian Lyons Lowe, of Survation, said: ‘The figures suggest that even with the Brexit Party contesting Labour-held seats, Labour is vulnerable in places it has held for decades. The effect of the disproportionate fall in Labour support in this poll will vary from seat to seat. However, the Tories will be confident of winning all target seats in the North and Midlands where they need a 5 per cent swing, many of those where up to a 10 per cent swing is required, and possibly others too.’
The North and Midlands has become the key election battleground. With the Conservatives expected to lose seats in Scotland and pro-Remain areas in London and the South, Mr Johnson must advance in the North and Midlands to win a Commons majority.
Corbyn allies say a deep-seated loathing of the Conservatives in working-class communities in the North and Midlands means they are safe for Labour.
But Johnson aides say Mr Corbyn’s Brexit ‘dither and delay’, allied to a sense that Northern and Midlands Labour voters feel alienated from his Islington brand of Left-wing politics, provides a potential breakthrough.
The poll found that Mr Johnson is regarded as best Prime Minister by 46 per cent of voters, while 30 per cent say Mr Corbyn would do a better job in No 10.
A total of 3,082 people took part in the poll in the East Midlands, West Midlands, Yorkshire and the Humber, North East and North West on Thursday and yesterday
