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Sir Keir Starmer must introduce a “fully independent” disciplinary system for Labour members to counter claims the party uses complaints to target left-wingers, the senior lawyer behind a review into racism in the party has said.
Martin Forde KC, commissioned by Starmer to author a 2022 report on the party’s internal culture, urged Labour to employ independent arbiters to deal with complaints against MPs and candidates, instead of party apparatchiks.
Forde told the Financial Times: “If you want people to have confidence in your disciplinary system, you need to have safeguards in place whereby you can go to those that are complaining about factionalism and say, ‘Well it can’t be factionalist, because an independent lawyer looked at the facts’.”
His intervention came after long-simmering tensions between the party’s ruling centrist wing and hobbled left erupted once again this week in the wake of a row over the disciplinary treatment of Azhar Ali, who has been dropped as Labour’s candidate in the upcoming Rochdale by-election.
Ali was initially defended by Labour after a leaked recording of a local grassroots party meeting revealed he claimed Israel allowed Hamas to attack on October 7 as a pretext for invading Gaza. He has apologised for repeating the conspiracy theory.
Momentum, the left-wing campaign group within Labour, argued Ali was treated more leniently than left-wing MPs in an example of “blatant double standards” because he was a factional ally of the current leadership.
Labour frontbenchers insisted Ali was not initially suspended because of his swift apology and his past record as an ally of the Jewish community, including setting up the group Muslims Against Anti-Semitism.
The comments also emerged after it was too late for Labour to pick a different candidate in the by-election under electoral rules.
Ali was suspended when further leaked comments were published in which he blamed “people in the media from certain Jewish quarters” for fuelling criticism of a pro-Palestinian Labour MP.
Forde contrasted Labour’s initial defence of Ali with the case of left-wing Labour MPs such as Kate Osamor, suspended last month for saying the conflict in Gaza should be remembered as a genocide in a social media post about Holocaust Memorial Day. She has also apologised.
While he acknowledged commissioning independent figures who were not card-carrying Labour members to make all disciplinary decisions could be expensive, he said the set-up needed to be “as independent as possible” to ensure it is seen as a “fair, transparent system”.
Independent former civil servants, businesspeople or professionals with a background in human resources would be suitable choices to run Labour’s disciplinary system, he added.
He also recommended greater transparency around the party’s rules and penalties for transgressions and advised the party to deal with complaints with greater speed.
Forde initially made many of these recommendations in his report in 2022. He welcomed Labour’s decision to accept the majority of his proposals, but insisted further “refinement” of its disciplinary processes was required.
Labour introduced some reforms after Forde’s report and complaints are assessed by independent figures later in its disciplinary process. But initial determinations are made by a panel selected from Labour’s national executive committee, where the party’s centrists command a majority.
Forde spoke out after Starmer was urged to overhaul the vetting process for party candidates to ensure any party activists espousing antisemitic views or conspiracy theories were blocked from standing.
Mike Katz, chair of the Jewish Labour Movement, told the FT earlier this week Labour needed to improve its due diligence in the wake of the Israel-Hamas conflict, which has fuelled an increase in both antisemitism and Islamophobia across the UK.
Starmer, elected to the opposition party’s top job in 2020, staked his leadership on a crackdown on antisemitism after the equalities watchdog found Labour was guilty of “unlawful acts of harassment and discrimination” involving antisemitism under the far left former leader Jeremy Corbyn. Labour in 2023 barred Corbyn from standing for re-election as a MP for the party.
A Labour spokesperson said the party “treats all complaints with the utmost seriousness” and that its process “ensures complaints are decided impartially, fairly and robustly”.
