Croydon Central Constituency Labour Party is backing David White in his appeal against suspension from the party over his Ken Livingstone/Zionist/Hitler tweet.
It is the first formal declaration of support for life-long party member White from his comrades in Croydon Labour since the episode began a fortnight ago. An ill-considered tweet of support for Ken Livingstone, which was quickly withdrawn, was seized upon by opportunistic local Tories keen for political gain in the London elections, and since by Blairite Progress types who dislike the idea of Labour including socialists among its membership.
An executive committee on Wednesday night voted unanimously to write to party HQ to ask Labour to restore White to full membership. Before his suspension, White was Croydon Central CLP’s secretary.
Croydon Central’s scheduled committee meeting was attended by nine members, including two elected councillors. Sarah Jones, Labour’s parliamentary candidate in Croydon Central last year who was 165 votes short of winning the seat from the Tories, is one of the CLP’s deputy chairs.
And on Thursday night, a meeting of the Croydon TUC said that it, too, would support White’s appeal against the suspension.
White issued a statement on Monday after belatedly receiving notification of his suspension, in which he condemned racism and discrimination in all forms and said, “I shall fight my suspension and work to be reinstated in the Labour Party.” He has declined to comment further since.
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I am not surprised that those who know David are supporting him and hope common sense prevails, as I am confident it will.
I note that the Sadvertiser story on this is a serious misrepresentation of the facts. The Tories have clearly learnt nothing from Goldsmith’s failed “nasty” campaign and are hoping that if they throw enough mud then some of it will stick.