A Labour Liverpool City Council candidate has apologised after she was revealed to have referred to a “typical Jew” on social media.

Sarah Doyle - the party’s candidate for the city’s Riverside ward - revealed to have written used the offensive phrase as well as "Hahahahahaha you jew" in Twitter posts written in 2013 and 2014.

Ms Doyle's selection as a Labour candidate was controversial, having ousted sitting councillor Michelle Corrigan, a new mum, in last year's selection process.

Ms Doyle told the Liverpool Echo: "When I was 17 and in school, before I was a Labour Party member I tweeted a naive comment.

"With the education I have received since joining the Labour Party, I now realise that the comment was ill-judged and unacceptable.

"I wholeheartedly apologise. Antisemitism is a real and serious scourge in modern society, and I recognise its presence in the Labour Party.

"It must be confronted wherever we find it. I hope to work alongside the Jewish community in Liverpool and Jewish Labour members in the fight to eradicate antisemitism in the Labour Party and in wider society."

Cllr Andrew Makinson, Liverpool's Liberal Democrat deputy leader, said: "This sort of casual antisemitism is designed to degrade and dehumanise Jewish people. It plays on centuries old racist stereotypes that have long been used to target and demonise this community.

“It plays on centuries old racist stereotypes that have long been used to target and demonise this community.”

Liverpool Mayor Joe Anderson said he had passed the issue on to Labour's regional office.

The news comes as the JC revealed Labour had suspended John Davies – an actor and branch chair in MP Dame Louise Ellman’s Liverpool Riverside seat - after he questioned Jewish MPs' loyalty to Britain.

Dame Louise - whose constituency covers the council seat Ms Doyle is hoping to win - has also talked regularly of the antisemitic abuse she has recieved.

Another council candidate in the city - Liam Moore - stood down after being accused of making antisemitic comments on social media.

He had tweeted that "Rothschilds Zionists run Israel and world governments" and claimed Labour was "infiltrated by sellouts who would sacrifice a Labour government for their 30 pieces of silver.”

He later turned up at a Momentum meeting and invited people to throw stones at him after his comments were exposed.

Liverpool Wavertree MP Luciana Berger cited Labour's failure to deal with its antisemitism as her main reason for quitting the party in February and join new party Change UK.