Jeremy Corbyn suspended by Labour party over antisemitism

Jeremy Corbyn has been suspended by the Labour party over antisemitism.

Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has been suspended from the Labour party

The former leader has also been stripped of the Labour whip in the House of Commons.

Sir Keir Starmer acted following the publication of a damning report by the Equality and Human Rights Commission on antisemitism under the former leader.A Labour spokesperson said: “In light of his comments made today and his failure to retract them subsequently, the Labour Party has suspended Jeremy Corbyn pending investigation.

"He has also had the whip removed from the Parliamentary Labour Party.”

It follows Mr Corbyn earlier dismissing his own responsibility in a fiery response to the report.

He said: “One antisemite is one too many, but the scale of the problem was also dramatically overstated for political reasons by our opponents inside and outside the party, as well as by much of the media.

“My sincere hope is that relations with Jewish communities can be rebuilt and those fears overcome.

"While I do not accept all of its findings, I trust its recommendations will be swiftly implemented to help move on from this period.”

In a TV interview recorded shortly before his suspension, Mr Corbyn had also furiously denied he was “part of the problem” and refused to resign.He said: “Of course not.“I’m proud to be a member of the Labour Party.“I joined the party at the age of 16.

“I’ve fought racism all my life and I will fight racism for the rest of my life, and as leader of the party I did everything I could to ensure we were an anti-racist party.”

Mr Corbyn has now vowed to “strongly contest the political intervention to suspend me”.He added: “I’ve made absolutely clear those who deny there has been an antisemitism problem in the Labour Party are wrong.

"I will continue to support a zero tolerance policy towards all forms of racism."

Speaking at his press conference, Sir Keir had promised to “look carefully at what Jeremy Corbyn has said in full.”

The EHRC had identified serious failings in the Labour Party leadership in addressing anti-Semitism and an inadequate process for handling complaints.

They found the party under Mr Corbyn was responsible for three breaches of the Equality Act (2010) relating to: political interference in complaints, failure to provide adequate training to those handling anti-Semitism cases and harassment.

The EHRC's interim chairwoman Caroline Waters said there had been "inexcusable" failures which "appeared to be a result of a lack of willingness to tackle anti-Semitism rather than an inability to do so".Responding to the suspension, the deputy leader of the Labour Party Angela Rayner admitted she and Sir Keir “failed” to do enough in the shadow cabinet.

She said: “We failed. We absolutely failed. We collectively failed.

"Jeremy is a fully decent man, but he has an absolute blind spot and denial when it comes to some of these issues. That is devastating.”

The suspension came shortly after the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism announced it had submitted fresh complaints against Mr Corbyn and 15 other MPs including Diane Abbott, Richard Burgon and Barry Gardiner.

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