Hackney councillor hits out at ‘rotten’ Labour following Diane Abbott’s suspension

Diane Abbott surrounded by supporters at a rally last year ahead of her reinstatement to the Labour party. Photograph: Maya Sall / free for use by LDRS partners

An opposition councillor in Hackney has called local MP Diane Abbott’s suspension “another shameful moment” for the Labour party.

Abbott, who has represented Hackney North and Stoke Newington since 1987, yesterday lost the Labour whip for a second time in two years.

It followed an interview on BBC Radio 4 earlier in the day during which she defended remarks she made about racism that led to her first suspension in 2023.

Asked if she stood by her original comments, Abbott said: “Clearly, there must be a difference between racism which is about colour and other types of racism because you can see a Traveller or a Jewish person walking down the street, you don’t know,” she said.

“I just think that it’s silly to try and claim that racism which is about skin colour is the same as other types of racism. I don’t know why people would say that.”

Labour last night announced that she had been suspended pending an investigation, with Abbott telling the BBC today that it was “obvious” the party leadership “wants me out”.

Hackney councillor Claudia Turbet-Delof, who along with two other colleagues quit Labour in 2024 to form the Independent Socialist group, was scathing in her reaction.

“In my view, the party is rotten at its core,” she told the Citizen. “It no longer has space for debate, for nuance, or for understanding the complexities of people’s lives.

“Whether MPs or councillors, elected representatives are expected to fall in line, stay silent, and prioritise party image over their communities.”

She said this is exactly why she and fellow Independent Socialist councillors Penny Wrout and Fliss Premru left the party.

“We could no longer stand by while our voices—and the voices of our residents—were silenced.

“The Labour party today is like a dying tree: its roots and core have decayed, and any branch that dares to grow with hope is quickly and completely cut off.

“What is happening – yet again – with Diane Abbott is not just about one MP, it’s about the erasure of political integrity, of radical Black women in politics, and of the possibility of a better future for working-class communities.”

Cllr Turbet-Delof added that Labour “is not the party of justice or compassion anymore. It is a party of silence, cruelty, punishment and political calculation.”

On Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, she said: “He is not a leader of nations, he is a weak and desperate power-grabbing man whose biggest legacy will be creating a political platform for the far right.”

Abbott’s first suspension followed a letter she wrote to the Observer in 2023 which read: “It is true that many types of white people with points of difference, such as redheads, can experience this prejudice.

“But they are not all their lives subject to racism. In pre-civil rights America, Irish people, Jewish people and Travellers were not required to sit at the back of the bus.

“In apartheid South Africa, these groups were allowed to vote. And at the height of slavery, there were no white-seeming people manacled on the slave ships.”

The letter was a response to a comment that Irish, Jewish and Traveller people all suffer from racism in the UK.

Abbott later retracted her comments, which Starmer called “antisemitic”, and she was eventually readmitted to the party in May 2024 following a lengthy ban.

Cllr Turbet-Delof was among the protesters who called for Abbott’s reinstatement in March last year.

Hackney Labour did not want to comment. The borough’s other political parties have also been approached.