Green councillors demand reinstatement of Cllr Puech keffiyeh photo
Five Green party councillors have launched a petition and published an open letter demanding that Hackney Council reinstate an official photograph of Cllr Brenda Puech wearing a keffiyeh.
As the Citizen reported, the portrait of Cllr Puech, a newly elected Green, was taken down from the council website after a complaint from UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI). The image showed her wearing the black-and-white scarf, widely regarded as a symbol of support for Palestinians, around her neck.
In a letter to the council dated 3 June, UKLFI argued that the image was “causing distress to at least one Jewish resident of the borough”. It was subsequently removed.
‘Natural justice’
On Tuesday (16 June), Cllrs Tyrone Scott, Ülgen Semerci, George Sheldon Grün, Dr Cathy Troupp and Jas Crowe published their open letter calling for the photograph to be restored “without delay”, and launched an accompanying petition.
They wrote that Cllr Puech “did not consent to its removal and was not consulted on the decision”, adding that Mayor Zoë Garbett and her cabinet “were not consulted, do not agree with the decision”, and that the mayor’s subsequent requests for reinstatement had not been accepted by council officers. “We call for the immediate reinstatement of the photograph,” they said.
The letter set out four main objections. Chief among them was that neither Cllr Puech nor any other Green party councillor had been consulted, while UKLFI’s views had been considered — a process the group said “contravenes the principle of natural justice”.
Symbol dispute
The councillors also rejected UKLFI’s characterisation of the keffiyeh as a “divisive political symbol” linked to “hostility towards Israel and, in some cases, with terrorist organisations and antisemitism”. They described the claim as “unfounded, designed to intimidate and an attack on freedom of expression” under the European Convention on Human Rights.
The group said it believed the “conflation of Jewishness with support for the actions and policies of the State of Israel is an antisemitic position”, one it would “always reject”. Reinstating the photograph, the letter concluded, was “the right thing to do – both legally and morally”.
At the time of writing the petition had 235 signatures, 196 of them verified, including councillors from the Green Party and other parties as well as residents from Hackney and beyond.
Mayor’s response
A spokesperson for Mayor Garbett said: “The mayor welcomes this open letter. As the letter notes, Mayor Zoë Garbett and her cabinet were not consulted, do not agree with the decision, and subsequent requests the mayor has made for the photograph to be reinstated have not been accepted by Hackney Council officers.
“The mayor continues to explore next steps as to how to proceed on this matter. As she works on this, she welcomes the input of community members in raising concerns alongside her.”
Earlier, a spokesperson for Hackney Labour party told the Local Democracy Reporting Service that the council’s website should remain “impartial in matters of religion and belief”.
“Care should be taken to avoid any appearance of community pressure, coercion, or preferential treatment that could lead residents to feel that one faith is being elevated above others,” they said. “An inclusive and neutral approach helps ensure that all members of the community feel equally represented and respected.”
Cross-party support
Writing in the comments beneath the Citizen’s earlier report, former Hackney Conservative councillor Isaac Leibowitz voiced support for Cllr Puech.
“As a Charedi Jew, I am worried that a councillor is being denied to have her portrait on the council’s website for wearing something of her choice,” he wrote, asking what might be refused next.
Leibowitz said it “would not be fair” for a councillor to wear something that “commands political action such as Free Palestine or boycott goods” on a publicly funded site, but felt that in Cllr Puech’s case “the choice of dress should not be denied even for a councillor whilst performing civic duties”.
Responding on Monday, Cllr Puech wrote on X: “A blank space on @HackneyCouncil website where my mugshot used to be! Fortunately I can still publicise my surgery times, though photo below is too offensive to publish. You now need refer to UKLFI media to see what I look like as they are quite happy to show the offensive image.” The post is pinned to the top of her account.
She has also reposted a comment describing UKLFI as “a threat to democracy and our way of life” and calling for the group to be proscribed.
Abhorrent response from Labour about “belief” and “religion”. The keffiyeh has nothing to do with religion and shocking that Labour in Hackney can be this ignorant or wilfully divisive.
UKFLI influence on Hackney politics must be curbed.
Whilst I appreciate many are concerned about the implications of political bias, what this really is about is the legacy of a council that has been monopolised by Labour for far too long.
During that time it has become common that effectively Council officers are running the Council, rather than carrying out the jobs they are paid to do in line with the policies that Councillors have taken decisions on.
Too many Labour Councillors have been only too happy to delegate, including direct enquiries from local residents, to officers. Which effectively makes Councillors irrelevant, and worse, when they should be able to stand back from their working relationship with officers, not take the easy route of rubber stamping whatever was put in front of them as being the “correct” response but query whether the resident is in the right.
And with a complaints system that is a joke and apparently run by work experience students, means it is no wonder council employees felt able to take a decision without double checking what the official position of the council was.
First of all a letter from a group that are political activists is not one that the Council has to take as being anything other than a political tactic. Added to which the letter claimed one Hackney resident had been upset. And whilst saying the complaints system is a joke, the officers (who appear to have confidence in the complaint system they manage) should have replied please let the resident concerned know they should use the official complaint system so that it can be dealt with within the existing work practices of Hackney Council.
In responding as they have done Council Officers could now find themselves deluged with letters from any number of political activists groups saying this is wrong in terms of our beliefs you must respond now. My neighbour is upset by ….
And even if as a precautionary step the picture was removed, obviously officers should have immediately contacted the Councillor concerned (and the Mayor) to say this has happened and what next steps should now be taken.
Instead Hackney residents are being put through bloated statements about political positions, rather than who is running Hackney Council.
Councillors are not under the same obligation as council employees to not indicate political positions. So it is not clear why the photo was not allowed. In a community as diverse as Hackney, and assuming Councillors reflect that, what if we were all to stir up tensions and unnecessary point scoring by niggling about an article of dress. Or claiming as the observer of what ever it is, that you know what the intent is of the wearer even though they have no evidence that is the intent of the wearer.
I would suggest before we get any more letters, petitions of political posturing etc., that Officers have the decency to say they acted in haste. And if there is no existing Council policy (ie one agreed by Councillors not cobbled together by Officers) there is a grown up conversation, and an attempt to reach an agreement for the future and what ever it is is then made public.
But in the meant time let this be a warning to the Greens.
If you want to make change you are going to have to change the existing work practices that Labour has allowed to creep in, that reduces Councillors functions as little more than adornments to announcements of decisions taken by officers.
And whoever allowed themselves to be used by a group of activists should use the complaints procedure.
I rather agree with Jay’s concerns here, having been wondering how soon entrenched Council officialdom would come into conflict with the new Green administration.
Officers’ high-handed and ridiculously overly entitled behaviour has been a perennial problem in Hackney for as long as I’ve been observing how the Council managed things. The recently deposed Labour administration rubber-stamped far too much of that mismanagement; an approach which I very much hope that the new Mayor and her fellows abandon immediately.
I don’t see a problem, the elected Councilors have instructed the unelected Council officers to reinstate the photo if this is not done immediately sack them.
I have thought more about this, because it does seem so strange. Not sure at what level in the pecking order at the Council, is the person who took the decision. Did they check with their line manager or the CE?
It sets a really dangerous precedent to respond to a political campaign in this way. Or is this in fact a reflection of the bias within the employees at Hackney. Would my favourite political campaign get this preferential treatment. Can PSC now write in and say “a Hackney resident” is intimidated by this negating act of a Councillors right to freedom of expression.
At the moment the people who are winning are a campaign group that has got everyone running round in circles pumping the arguments we all know – and we all know there are at least 2 if not more positions on this. Just like the marches.
Whichever officer/s did this has now embroiled the Council itself in apparently taking sides.
Suggest as soon as possible the CE apologises for error. Clarifying that any complaint submitted by an actual resident of Hackney will be looked at in a professional and unbiased way.
At that at some point in the near future Councillors and Officers meet and agree a policy. Not just on this item of clothing but an over arching approach. According to AI(!) no other Council has in any way said that the wearing of this scarf is a hostile act.
I really dont understand what is going on at Hackney Council. I expect that many council employees are doing a good job in probably not great circumstances. eg having to sort out the mess of years of bad management of council housing.
But there seem to be others who operate on some sort of Trumpian position, of this is what I / my department wants, so we will engineer this. As though the Council exists for the gratification of its employees rather than a service to residents and rate payers.
Please can we stop this circus now.
Accept that UKLFI put one over on the Council. Very clever. ha ha.
I am not troubled by Councillors having political view points so long as it doesn’t stop them fulfilling their role. One of which is to see that the Town Hall carries out its primary duties of providing a service to people in Hackney.
yes, mr anthony, if despite a landslide election-victory for the greens, hackney council is still being controlled by the crooked labour party, then this completely unacceptable situation would constitute a most serious case of municipal corruption – which at the very least, demands a full police-investigation…
moreover, if the new mayor does not get shot of anti-greenite officers who, on labour’s behalf, are staging a sulky rear-guard action against her fresh administration, then she will never regain control of the borough-ship for the duration of her term of office – and will ultimately comprise no more than a rather pathetic pink-fringed political ornament, fit only for sitting on the town-hall mantlepiece.
is mayor gobbett a woman or a wimp?
i mean-to-say, i encountered this self-same problem at the home office, when there was an attempt to oust me as top bitch by whingeing pro-eu civil servants, but of course i soon brought that perfumed pack of eton-and-harrow educated toffs to heel – with the help of their own old school ties and a well-aimed knee-in-the-nuts…
and so can this middle-class madam of a mayor show the facety hackney-firm who’s boss? well, i truly doubt it – unless she sacks every council officer and starts to recruit again from scratch, as the police service of northern ireland was formerly forced to do.
let’s face it, if mayor mouth were to can the entire incumbent cabal of council grifters, it would amount to no huge loss – since half the town-hall’s staff are on-the-take, and the other half sky high on class-a drugs.
by-the-way, mr walker, president trump would never tolerate officials who consider a government department to exist purely for their personal benefit – he’d dismiss the lot-of-’em, and probably axe the whole department as well, if it proved to serve no publicly justifiable purpose, or to act as a corrupt cash-conduit to criminals, terrorists, or the butchers engaged in africa’s blood-mineral genocide – and therefore i cannot comprehend how self-serving government employees, such as those whom you mention, could somehow be deemed to hold a “trumpian position”? don’t elected politicians always use their public positions to implement their preferred policies?
This should be simple. Mayor Zoe should call the relevant officials into her office. Tell them to reinstate that pic in 24 hours, or sack them.
This is a tanks on the lawn moment for the new mayor – the offcials, often personal and political friends of the sleazy gang Zoe got rid of, want to make it clear that they run the council, not an electer mayor. They must not succeed
I wasn’t going to comment again, but talk about the tail wagging the dog.
Have only just looked at the text of the open letter linked in the article. How do these councillors think the Town Hall is structured.
They are effectively writing to themselves. They are the policy makers.
If this is the level of understanding about being a councillor no wonder it ended up with Labour Councillors being pointless, and the poodles of officers.
The Greens obviously still see themselves as some minority political campaign, relentlessly standing up to “the establishment”. And they have fallen for the bait of a group of provocateurs.
Does anybody know any of these Councillors and point out they are meant to be in charge?
There is meant to be an association of Green Councillors set up to help new Councillors. Someone needs to send them an SOS that urgent Councillor training is needed in Hackney.
No Council officer had the right to decide what to do because when there is no policy.
Policy is decided by Councillors. Council officers then implement it.
And yet here is this bunch of newbies Councillors voluntarily giving away their right to create policies in lines with the principles they stood on to get elected.
This is a head in hands moment.
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re “trumpian position” everyone knows that when Trump wants something he thinks he is entitled to have it, whether Greenland or a new ballroom. And it appears (some) Council officers think this is the basis on which they can carry out their work. Even if this is at the expense of grabbing (with out due process), community assets and occupying them for themselves. And have been know to say when asked why they are doing this “We can do what we want. Nobody can stop us.”
i admit, mr walker, that i was being a bit picky when i criticized your use of the term “trumpian position” to describe rogue council officers making-up policy on-the-hoof – however i concur wholeheartedly with your detailed assessment of the municipal dysfunction and administrative totalitarianism which is rife within the hackney council executive – and must infer, from the obvious depth of your disturbing experience, that you are intimately acquainted with the institutional, and systemic, bullying to which hackney residents are relentlessly subjected by two-bit town-hall empire-builders.
it is of course true that president trump is considered a rogue-actor by washington’s neo-imperialist establishment – no matter how hard he tries to impress it by bombing iranians and houthis into oblivion.
here in right-minded britain, we behold, dumbfounded, the green party’s ideological support for the neo-nazi controlled government in ukraine, the green party’s ideological support for nato‘s never-ending neo-imperialist war against russia, the green party’s ideological perpetration of the criminal cia climate-emergency hoax, and even the green party’s ideological support for the neo-imperialist blood-mineral-extracting entity, the european union, yet were these policies not already evidence enough of the green party’s inherently crypto-neoimperialist nature, then this green hackney mayor’s patently, and pathetically, cosmetic support for peaceful pro-palestinian activism now just about confirms the shamelessly opportunistic green party as in fact constituting a covert cia-construct of the corrupt neo-imperialist establishment…
and naturally, i should know this to be true, since i myself am a card-carrying member of this neocon-war loving neo-colonial establishment.
the green party simply comprises a cia-controlled-and-created opposition movement – fashioned from precisely the same intelligence-service mould as that other cia honey-trap set for left-wing and anti-israeli activists, the pseudo-ploughshares pressure-group known as palestine action.
incidentally, the ultra-nationalist neo-nazi firms which, with the cia‘s full assistance, overthrew, and infiltrated, the ukrainian government in 2014 – and which gained effective control of ukraine’s defence-ministry – have always been ideologically committed to establishing not only an ‘all-white’ ukraine, but one cleansed of ethnic russians.
i should add that the usurpation of the ukrainian government by ultra-nationalist neo-nazi firms is a topic covered extensively by the bbc – nevertheless this cia-manipulated media-outlet only did so between 2012 and 2020, because the neo-imperialist biden-administration expediently banned any further such reporting.