Labour’s splits on racism go back 20 years

An extraordinary memo, written by former Labour Councillor – and former Council Leader –Michael Keith has revealed that Labour’s internal splits on the issue of race go back nearly 20 years. In the memo, Michael Keith twice accused John Biggs, then Labour Leader of the Council, of racism. “In short, I would accuse John Biggs of racism” says Cllr Michael Keith.

Various allegations of racism have been levelled at the Labour Party over recent years. They are often quickly refuted by Labour on the basis that no members of the Party are overtly racist and neither is the Party as a whole. This does rather miss the point of the recent allegations, which is more that Labour is “institutionally racist” or systemically racist because of its practices. In the furore over denying that it is plain “racist”, Labour has got away with never really having to account for its practices and defend them in a serious way against the allegations of institutional racism.

The row flared up again most recently after Tower Hamlets electors voted to adopt the Mayoral system in the borough. Labour’s selection process was seen as trying to ensure that a candidate favoured by the Party Headquarters was selected. When local Labour members selected Lutfur Rahman (not the choice of party bigwigs) as Labour’s mayoral candidate, national party officers vetod the outcome of the selection and anointed their own candidate (who had come third in the members’ ballot).  The clear perception (and probably the reality) was that Labour was perfectly prepared to have a Bangladeshi candidate and mayor (not racist, then) but it was only prepared to have a Bangladeshi candidate who was chosen by national party figures, not by local members, particularly Bangladeshi members. It is this over-ruling of – perhaps even contempt for – the views of local Bangladeshi members that has most fuelled the accusations of institutional racism.

However, notwithstanding what has happened in recent years, it will come as a severe shock to many in the local Labour Party (not least most of its candidates, many of whom were probably not active members of the local Labour Party 20 years ago) that allegations of institutional racism – specifically, the use of coded language to pander to racism – were being made in the early 1990s. It will also come as a surprise that the allegations were made by the then Cllr Michael Keith and that the target was the then Cllr John Biggs.

The key question now is not quite so much whether John Biggs is guilty as charged (then or more recently), but whether he will issue a full explanation of what happened, release the documents he wrote which are referred to as evidence of Michael Keith’s charges, and state whether he now stands by his past actions or not.

Biggs has indicated that he would be an accountable Mayor. So far, the main example of how accountable he would be is that he will answer questions at Council himself, rather than having his Cabinet Members answer portfolio-specific questions. There are few Council meetings and question time is limited: this offer, then, amounts to something like three hours a year of accountability.  Biggs needs to go further. He could issue a denial that he is racist and let the whole argument continue with accusations and counter-accusations. Alternatively, he could defuse the row by disclosing the documents which are the substance of the allegations and justifying his position (or apologising, as appropriate). That would be a strong sign that he intends to be accountable to the voters.

John: we’re waiting!

*East London News has spoken to John Biggs and asked him to comment on the above. He asked for time to consider the memo as a whole.  We await hearing from him.