When it landed on Keir Starmer’s desk last month the conclusions of the long-awaited Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) investigation into antisemitism in his party were stark: Labour could have tackled it more effectively “if the leadership had chosen to do so”.
The Guardian’s deputy political editor Jessica Elgot tells Anushka Asthana that it marks what the party hopes is the end of an ignominious chapter in Labour’s history. Only the far-right British National Party have been the subject of a similar investigation. The EHRC’s verdict confirmed what many Jewish Labour members had long been complaining of: it found specific examples of harassment, discrimination and political interference in cases.
As the party’s new leadership took in the implications of the report, its former leader Jeremy Corbyn took issue with the way the issue was presented. Hours later he was suspended from the party. With relations between Labour and Britain’s Jewish communities strained to breaking point, can trust be rebuilt?
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