LABOUR has been accused of corruption after barring a left-wing union rep from standing for election to Hackney council over her support for the local MP Diane Abbott.
Regional party organisers have meanwhile unsuspended their preferred candidate Laura Pascal after five days, after she apologised for having liked tweets described as “grossly offensive” by the local Green Party.
The by-election follows Hackney’s elected Mayor Philip Glanville’s resignation for lying over his dealings with former councillor and now-convicted paedophile Tom Dewey, revealed by the Morning Star.
It comes as a report which found an overly close culture between elected members and officials in the wake of the Dewey scandal is to be discussed at an extraordinary council meeting next week.
Lucie Scott, 54, president of the National Education Union’s Camden branch, accused Labour of a “right-wing stitch-up” after she was disqualified from standing in Cazenove last December.
In an email setting out its reasons seen by the Star, regional bosses cited her protesting outside the Labour Party conference to “restore the whip to Diane Abbott after removal for suggesting Jewish people do not suffer racism” on October 8.
It provided a link to a Morning Star report of the protest, which quoted Ms Scott telling a rally calling for the restoration of the party whip to the longest-serving black MP and that Labour should not be taking the black vote for granted.
Labour also quoted Ms Scott telling The Voice “we want Diane Abbott to continue to be our MP” and what Ms Scott says is a distorted Times Radio report of a row between pro-Palestinian protesters and a Jewish person at the conference the following day.
Ms Scott, a mum-of-three secondary school teacher who overcame a difficult upbringing in foster care by going to university and was ethnic minorities forum officer at Ms Abbott’s constituency party at the time, told the Star: “It’s outrageous and I’ve had no opportunity to speak out and clear my name.
“I was addressing my concerns about black members being disenfranchised.
“My main calls were for her to have a fair process.”
Ms Abbott, the former shadow home secretary under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, remains suspended from the party pending an investigation after claiming last April that white minority groups do not suffer racism in the same way as ethnic minorities.
The MP told the Star: “I am very concerned about the Lucie Scott situation. One of the reasons the Labour Party struck her off the candidates list was because she had made some short statements in support of me.
“I think it is outrageous that she should be penalised in this way before the inquiry into my letter to the Observer was completed.
“She was struck off the candidates list with no due process.
“I think that she has been treated very unfairly and local people of colour believe it is partly because she is a woman of colour.”
Ms Scott said Labour gave her just over 24 hours to respond to an invitation to a meeting over her disqualification sent in an email on a Sunday, which she missed.
London regional organiser Liam Carroll announced a decision to “administratively suspend” Ms Pascal last Friday, halting campaigning, which was reversed on Wednesday night, alongside her apology over “social media activity which fell well below the standard expected of someone seeking election to public office.”
The local Green Party had called on Labour to address “grossly offensive and prejudiced comments shared and ‘liked’ by” her on Twitter.
Though the Green statement did not detail these, they are believed to refer to comparisons of blackface with “womanface” which attracted online accusations of transphobia.
Ms Scott said the party’s contrasting handling of the cases showed shameful “racial and factional disparity in response and outcome.”
Labour Women’s Declaration had urged the party to deal with the complaint about Ms Pacal quickly, noting the timing of complaints from an electoral rival — the Greens — just before an election and drawing attention to the recent Rachel Meade vs Westminster Council and Social Work England case, in which the judge said more attention should have been paid to the motivations of accusers before instigating a disciplinary process amounting itself to harassment.
Labour, which was contacted for comment, fielded Ms Pascal after Cazenove councillor Caroline Woodley succeeded Mr Glanville as mayor.
The council is to note an “internal governance review” by former Staffordshire Council Council chief executive John Henderson into the Dewey scandal next Wednesday.
