East London News A Force for the community…
On the night of 3rd August, a woman sadly lost her life and five other people were injured as a man with mental health problems launched a random knife attach in Russell Square.
At lunchtime on 4th August, Jeremy Corbyn referred to the incident at the start of a press conference. He expressed his condolences to the victims’ families, expressed appreciation to the emergency services for their response and said he would not speculate on what had caused the attack. Among those who tweeted a short video of his comments was BBC journalist Carole Walker.
Almost immediately, Jim Fitzpatrick, Labour MP for Poplar & Limehouse (Tower Hamlets) retweeted Ms Walker’s tweet and added his own comments. Did he add his own condolences to the victims’ families, or those of the people of Poplar? No. Did the MP – himself a former firefighter – also thank the emergency services? No. Did he agree, given that his own constituents have been victims of Islamphobia, that speculation that the attack might have been a terrorist incident was not appropriate? Thrice no, as Frankie Howard might have said if he had ever filmed an episode of “Up Poplar”.
The local MP’s additional personal comments on the retweet were: “Pity Jeremy’s team didn’t teach him how to use both autocue screens.” Mr Fitzpatrick may be feeling a little sore from last month’s meeting of his constituency party, which voted to nominate Jeremy Corbyn MP in the leadership contest rather than the candidate that he personally preferred, the rebel challenger Owen Smith MP. Nonetheless, the glib remark does seem quite tasteless in the context of an innocent person having lost her life and others being seriously injured.
Mr Fitzpatrick has been contacted for comment on this matter.
•Mr Fitzpatrick has also found time to cast doubt on whether Labour could hold the Poplar & Limehouse seat at the next General Election (above). He was asked on Twitter, by author Andrew Godsell (in a tweet marked “#Corbyn Stays”), to consider standing down so that others could take up the cause of socialism in the area. Jim responded by confirming that he personally will not be asking local members to adopt him as the next Labour parliamentary candidate when one is next chosen. However, he went on to say that Jeremy Corbyn could lose the seat.
In the 2015 General Election, Labour received just under 30,000 votes, with the Tories in a distant second place with just under 13,000 votes – leaving Jim’s comments sounding more like sour grapes than a sound and rational political forecast.
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