Team Corbyn - Hypocrites R Us!
John McDonnell last year on whistleblowers... https://t.co/jkPcHoRZPJ pic.twitter.com/eK1eMYu2Mf— Adam Langleben (@adamlangleben) July 6, 2019
Team Corbyn are making just about every mistake in the book as they seek to minimise the potentially damaging fallout from tonight's BBC Panorama programme on antisemitism in the Labour Party.
Jeremy's right-hand-man John McDonnell seems not to realise the Labour leadership look like a bunch of complete hypocrites by bringing in expensive media lawyers to enforce gagging orders on staff.
Tom Watson criticises Labour’s gagging orders on staff
By Kate Devlin and Elizabeth Burden - The Sunday Times
Labour’s deputy leader said gagging orders were not his party’s way - KIRSTY O’CONNOR/PA
Tom Watson, Labour’s deputy leader, has criticised his own party for using gagging orders in a bid to silence former staff members over antisemitism allegations.
An hour-long BBC Panorama documentary entitled Is Labour Anti-Semitic?, to be broadcast on Wednesday, is set to include claims by up to half a dozen ex-Labour employees.
Sam Matthews, the party’s former head of disputes, has been warned by Carter-Ruck, Labour’s lawyers, that he may face legal reprisals for breaching his non-disclosure agreement (NDA).
Watson said using expensive media lawyers to try to silence employees was futile and stupid. “It’s not the Labour way and I deplore it,” he tweeted.
Wes Streeting, the Labour MP for Ilford North, pledged to use parliamentary privilege to blow the whistle on anti-semitism in his party, which he said claimed to oppose gagging orders while using them itself. “Sunlight is the best disinfectant,” he wrote. “No more excuses or hiding places. You should promise the same, Jeremy Corbyn.”
But Barry Gardiner, the shadow international trade secretary, accused Panorama of presenting a “partial view” from former staff members who have an axe to grind.
He also insisted his party did not use gagging orders to cover up illegal behaviour. He told Sky News’s Sophy Ridge that the party used the agreements to prevent former members of staff leaking confidential information.
John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor, also defended the legal letters.
He said the party was just “reminding them of their confidentiality agreements”.
He denied Labour was hypocritical and said the party was still in favour of greater legal protections for whistleblowers, especially in cases where they had suffered intimidation or harassment.
A Labour source said the party would be complaining to Lord Hall, the director-general of the BBC: “We have serious concerns about how they have used taxpayers’ money to produce this programme.
“Rather than investigating anti-semitism in the Labour Party in a balanced and impartial way, Panorama appears to have predetermined its outcome and created a programme to fit a one-sided narrative.
“Meanwhile, the BBC has ignored recent polling showing that nearly half of Conservative members hold racist and Islamophobic views — the very people who are about to choose our next prime minister.
“With a possible general election around the corner, this smacks of bias and interference in the political process by the BBC and a clear breach of their own editorial guidelines.”
A spokesman for Panorama said: “The Labour Party is criticising a programme they have not seen.
“We are confident the programme will adhere to the BBC’s editorial guidelines.
“In line with those, the Labour Party has been given the opportunity to respond to the allegations.”
