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Suspend Tory Daniel Kawczynski for attending conference with 'racists', says Jewish Labour Movement
'No member of parliament should be attending a conference packed full of racists, homophobes and Islamophobes'
February 4, 2020 14:50
'No member of parliament should be attending a conference packed full of racists, homophobes and Islamophobes'
February 4, 2020 14:50Dame Margaret Hodge has led calls for Boris Johnson to remove the whip from a Conservative MP who spoke at a conference alongside speakers from some of Europe’s far-right political parties.
Daniel Kawczynski defended his decision to appear at the National Conservatism conference in Rome with anti-immigration figures including the Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán and a niece of French far-right leader Marine Le Pen.
The MP claimed he had consulted with Tory whips before attending the event, which took place on Monday and Tuesday, as one of 22 speakers – including Ryszard Legutko, the Polish Law and Justice MEP who has said homophobia was a “totally fictitious problem”.
In a statement on Tuesday, issued by the Jewish Labour Movement, its parliamentary chair Dame Margaret said: "No member of Parliament should be attending a conference packed full of racists, homophobes and Islamophobes.
“If Daniel Kawczynski attends this conference then he must have the whip removed. There can be no place for these hateful views in our Parliament.”
JLM confirmed it had sent a letter to Mark Spencer, the Conservative Chief Whip, signed by its national chair Mike Katz, Dame Margaret, and Labour MP Alex Sobel calling for him to take action.
Mr Katz added: "JLM has consistently called out Labour MPs, councillors and indeed our party leader for sharing platforms with figures who hold dangerous and often antisemitic or homophobic views.
“So we can’t be silent when a Conservative MP uncritically shares a platform with those on the far right who promote equally hateful opinions.”
Mr Sobel added: “I have raised issues around antisemitism by the ruling parties of Poland and Hungary in Parliament and the media including when Daniel was present.
“To see him share a platform with these and other openly racist and anti-immigrant parties and knowing Victor Orban would be speaking shows he is willing to ally himself to their views which is deeply concerning.”
Others speaking at the event in Italy Hermann Tertsch, an MEP for the Spanish anti-immigrant Vox party, who has argued that General Franco was not a fascist and treated Catalans well.
Board of Deputies President Marie van der Zyl also condemned Mr Daniel Kawczynski, saying: “Mr Kawczynski’s defence, that ‘it is only common sense to talk with parties and politicians that are either leading their respective countries, or will perhaps take power in the next few years’, is a specious one, for the simple reason that the MP for Shrewsbury and Atcham is not any sort of government representative.
"If the Conservative Party fails to discipline Mr Kawczynski, it runs the serious risk of the public assuming that they share his views on association with such people.”
Andrew Percy, the co-chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Antisemitism and Mr Kawczynski fellow Conservative, said he urged him not to attend last week and would now be "raising the issue internally with the party".
"The attendance of this conference was wholly inappropriate," he said.
Earlier, Mr Kawczynski wrote a letter to the Shropshire Star, his local newspaper, saying: "Clearly, Messrs. Orban and Salvini are not to everyone’s tastes.
"But they represent serious ideas and concerns, some of which are shared by many citizens of the UK.”
He added he would attend to “share an Anglo-Polish perspective on Brexit and what it signifies for the future of Europe.
“But more than anything, I will seek to echo the wisdom of the late Sir Roger Scruton, who warned us not to accept the EU’s propaganda version of events that the fall of the Berlin Wall was only about ‘freedom of movement’.
"This is not true. The revolutions of 1989 were about the restoration of national sovereignty to people who had been absorbed and oppressed by a lawless empire.
"The fact that they are now absorbed by a lawful one does not alter the case."
