John McDonnell’s Forward Momentum faction wins control of the pro-Corbyn pressure group
The Forward Momentum faction has prevailed in internal elections in the pro-Corbyn pressure group.
Forward Momentum was backed by John McDonnell, the former Shadow Chancellor and senior ally of former Leader Jeremy Corbyn, and won on a platform of critical engagement with the new Labour Leader, Sir Keir Starmer.
The Momentum Renewal slate, which was backed by former Shadow Justice Secretary Richard Burgon and called for an uncompromising opposition to Sir Keir’s leadership, was defeated.
It is understood that Forward Momentum is also critical of what it perceived as the autocratic leadership style of former leader Jon Lansman, who was among Mr Corbyn’s most vocal Jewish supporters.
Momentum played a leading role in whitewashing the Labour Party’s antisemitism scandal during the period of Mr Corbyn’s leadership.
Mr McDonnell too has a long record of defending Labour’s abominable record on antisemitism. Recently, he retweeted a Twitter user with a history of extreme views and questioning the Holocaust. When this was brought to Mr McDonnell’s attention he deleted the retweet and unfollowed the user.
On 28th May 2019, the Equality and Human Rights Commission launched a full statutory investigation into antisemitism in the Labour Party following a formal referral and detailed legal representations from Campaign Against Antisemitism, which is the complainant.
In the first release of its Antisemitism in Political Parties research, Campaign Against Antisemitism showed that Labour Party candidates for Parliament in the 2019 general election accounted for 82 percent of all incidents of antisemitic discourse by parliamentary candidates.
Campaign Against Antisemitism’s Antisemitism Barometer 2019 showed that antisemitism on the far-left of British politics has surpassed that of the far-right.
Campaign Against Antisemitism advocates for zero tolerance of antisemitism in public life. To that end we monitor all political parties and strive to ensure that any cases of concern are properly addressed.
