Humiliation for Labour as party leaflets with dumped Rochdale byelection candidate still land on doorsteps
LABOUR’S by-election humiliation in Rochdale continues today as party pamphlets calling on residents to back their ditched candidate Azhar Ali land on doormats.
The four-page pamphlet – printed before the controversy – comes with a ringing endorsement from senior party figure Andy Burnham who insists he will be a “strong voice” for the region.
Labour withdrew their support for the controversial by-election candidate who claimed Israel deliberately allowed the October 7 massacre.
The embarrassing leaflet shows several pictures of Ali wearing a traditional red rosette telling locals to “vote Labour” at the end of the month.
Burnham, the Mayor of Greater Manchester, has his picture on the literature where he also says Ali will be a “powerful champion” for the town.
Five local residents are also pictured on the leaflet saying they back Ali’s plan to help improve the town centre and the nearby hospital.
Ali writes: “Residents don’t want empty promises, they want someone with a plan and a commitment to get things done.”
Mr Ali apologised after he was secretly recorded Lancashire Labour Party meeting suggesting that Israel had taken the Hamas assault as a pretext to invade Gaza.
Then wannabe MP Graham Jones was suspended on Tuesday after he used the words “f****** Israel” at the same meeting.
He also suggested British people who volunteer to fight with the Israel Defence Forces should be “locked up”.
Shadow Defence secretary John Healey said not everyone in his party was a “saint”. But he added that Labour should be judged on how it responds to complaints or allegations.
He said: “Restoring, retaining the trust of the Jewish community and any community is a constant process.
“And Keir Starmer is deeply, deeply aware of that. He pledged to root out antisemitism as part of the changes he wanted to make to Labour, regarded them as essential. He’s done that.
“But this is not a party of people who are saints.”
Mike Katz, chairman of the Jewish Labour Movement, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme he would like any party members at the Rochdale meeting to be suspended if they failed to call out the language used.
He said progress had been made by the Labour leadership to tackle antisemitism but the recent events had not been the party’s “finest hour”.
Katz said: “The idea that somehow we are still in the kind of the bad days of the Corbyn leadership is really ludicrous.
“We have gone through a transformation, the difference is like night and day in the way that we are treated as an organisation, the way that our members are treated.
“This has not been the party’s finest hour. We have huge lessons to learn, but the direction of travel is very much upwards. It’s very much in the right direction.”
Sir Keir Starmer insists the party has changed from the Jeremy Corbyn era. He said he had taken tough and decisive action to withdraw support from Ali.