JVL’s Graham Bash reportedly expelled from Labour Party
Graham Bash, the Political Officer of Jewish Voice for Labour (JVL) and the partner of the antisemite Jackie Walker, has reportedly been expelled from the Labour Party.
JVL is an antisemitism-denial group and sham Jewish representative organisation.
Mr Bash was accused in August in a Notice of Possible Auto-exclusion that he was facing automatic expulsion over alleged affiliation with Labour Against the Witchhunt, an antisemitism-denial group that has been proscribed by the Labour Party.
Mr Bash, an ally of Jeremy Corbyn and former Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell, has reportedly been investigated in the past over comments about “Jewish exceptionalism”.
Mr McDonnell tweeted in Mr Bash’s defence, writing: “I’ve known & campaigned alongside Graham Bash for over 40 years. He is one of the finest socialists I have met. I do not believe it can be just to expel someone from the Labour Party based upon actions or associations with an organisation before it has been proscribed. This week in Parliament alongside the whole of the PLP [Parliamentary Labour Party] I voted against the injustice of retrospective action like this being attempted by [Prime Minister Boris] Johnson & the Tories. If we condemn the Tories for this behaviour, it cannot be right for Labour to act in this way.”
JVL’s co-Founder, Leah Levane, was recently expelled from the Labour Party, while the group’s Media Officer, Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi, was suspended and readmitted.
The Labour Party was found by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) to have engaged in unlawful discrimination and harassment of Jews. The report followed the EHRC’s investigation of the Labour Party in which Campaign Against Antisemitism was the complainant, submitting hundreds of pages of evidence and legal argument. Sir Keir Starmer called the publication of the report a “day of shame” for the Labour Party.
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.
