Jeremy Corbyn’s admission that Labour may have “mislaid, ignored or not used” evidence of antisemitism proves statutory investigation is needed

It has emerged today that in a secretly-recorded conversation with Jewish Labour MP Dame Margaret Hodge, Jeremy Corbyn admitted that Labour may have “ignored or misplaced or not used”.

The admission, in a recording released by The Sunday Times, shows that even as he consistently assured the nation that Labour “takes antisemitism very seriously”, he actually believed that “evidence [of antisemitism within the Party] was either being mislaid, ignored or not used”.

The admission adds to the evidence that the Labour Party cannot be trusted to deal with antisemitism and must be subject to a full statutory investigation.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission has begun pre-enforcement proceedings against the Labour Party following a formal referral and detailed legal representations from Campaign Against Antisemitism, which is the complainant. The pre-enforcement proceedings are a precursor to opening a full statutory investigation.

Campaign Against Antisemitism declared the Labour Party to be “institutionally antisemitic” back in 2016, followed by other Jewish community charities two years later. In recent months, eleven MPs have resigned from the Labour Party over antisemitism.

Almost 50,000 people have now signed our petition denouncing Jeremy Corbyn as an antisemite and declaring him “unfit to hold any public office.”