Early in the election campaign, I visited Jewish Care. Unsurprisingly, questions focused on relations between Labour and the community. Even social care policy played second fiddle.
Afterwards, I was called over to speak to a group who wanted to chat privately. That was my first of many exchanges with “shy Jewish Labour voters”. They thanked me for standing and promised me their votes; but they didn’t want their friends to find out. For some, the issue was Theresa’s May “dementia tax” and my opponent’s failure to speak out on refugee issues like the Dubs Amendment. One wanted to reward Sadiq Khan, the Labour mayor of London.
Shy Jewish Labour voters kept popping up. They wouldn’t put up posters (one feared a brick through the window). Some ushered me inside because they couldn’t say what they wanted on the doorstep. Jewish students came to canvass away from their home turf to avoid knocking on doors of family friends. While I received a warm welcome at the Progressive shuls I visited, less predictably I was dragged away from the fishballs at Kinloss United by shy Labour Jews who were backing me in spite of (and because of) their shul chairman’s endorsement of my opponent.
The Labour vote could not have grown in the “bagel belt” of Hendon, Finchley and Golders Green and Chipping Barnet by the margins that it did without a significant increase in Labour votes from Jews. These seats showed increased Labour votes in the most concentrated Jewish polling districts.
