Sarah Champion

Good for Sarah Champion - in an interview today with the Times she says "I'd rather be called a racist than turn a blind eye to child abuse."
She says she has had massive support from social workers, police and others who are relieved that finally someone is speaking out - they are hoping they can now start to tackle the issue of why it's happening.
I wish I had an MP who was brave enough to challenge the party leadership for the sake of their constituents.

Your comment suggests there is something wrong in my concern that sexual exploitation might be part of £12.50 buying a pint 2 packs of crisps and a hand job. You can argue it might be a 'transaction between 2 adults and one entered into voluntarily" but I don't agree with you. My experience of children and adults who have been sexually exploited is one of the many reasons I find this MP's comment unacceptable.

This is nothing to do with women only train carriages trisher. It's about a Labour MP who thinks it's funny to say you get 2 pints of beer, a packet of crisps and a hand job for £12.50 in Barrow. Which is the constituency he represents.

I agree with you Iam64. It's the mindset.

There's nothing about young people, sexual preference, or exploitation in the joke. Arguably it is a transaction between 2 adults and one entered into voluntarily. If you see sexual exploitation in it that is your interpretation.

A 'terrible joke but only that'
To refer to a statement of that kind, from an MP in that way worries me. It's unacceptable for a man in a position of power to have a mindset that enables him to make that kind of comment.
We have other threads discussing the sexual exploitation of vulnerable young people and we have an MP making a 'joke' like that. I'm like Queen Victoria I'm just not amused - at all

Terrible joke but only that.
The issue of women only carriages was not started by Corbyn or by Labour
In September 2014, Parliamentary Under Secretary for transport Claire Perry MP mentioned a possible revival of the women-only carriages idea during a speech to a fringe event at the Conservative Party conference.[31] In August 2015, Labour leadership candidate Jeremy Corbyn said he would consult on the option of introducing women-only carriages to help reduce harassment.[32]

I think Jess Phillips nailed it when she spoke about left-wing men being "the absolute worst sexists". And in these northern towns/cities where this dreadful abuse is happening, the Labour Party should be speaking out against it & supporting women like Sarah Champion & Amina Lowe instead of sacking them.

I've just read that article, primrose and am shocked by what it says about the Labour Party.

He should have taken Naz Shar's advice and ' kept his mouth shut'
In my eyes he does have one redeeming feature: he thinks the Labour Party is f****d ( his word) with Corbyn as leader.
I would suggest with his small majority his card is marked.

Thanks Primrose - I hadn't seen that. Absolutely disgusting and the man ought to be ashamed of himself. It isn't good enough to blame his sense of humour then apologise. Any man who can speak so disrespectfully about women and with such disregard for the damage sex work can cause to women girls, men and boys - well I wouldn't want him as an MP

Labour List ran a survey, asked if Sarah Chapman shoucld have resigned, result NO, so not in tune with the leader

You usually post links dj
That comes from this article about a Labour MP making jokes about getting a 'hand job' in Barrow, then excused himself as having a lame sense of humour.
You really start to understand what Sarah Champion and Amina Lone have to deal with.

inews.co.uk/essentials/news/politics/labour-mp-john-woodcock-rapped-lewd-sex-joke/

Amina Lone.

"However on Sunday Amina Lone tweeted “Just to clarify as some confusion, deselection happened in June not because of any recent interviews.” "

There's an article about her in the Sunday Times today.
"She said: “So many black and minority ethnic women in the Labour Party are terrified. The silencing is so acute, the fear is so acute. I’m the only one that’s speaking publicly and I’ve been warned a lot this year. I was told one of the reasons I was deselected was because I wouldn’t keep quiet.”
Her statement about being told to keep quiet is quite alarming yet believable in the light of Naz Shah MP sharing a tweet telling sex abuse victims to 'keep their mouths shut'.

I think dbDB77 that they only make a charge for FOI applications if it's for commercial purposes. I agree with you that the information should, ideally, be readily available anyway, but if it's not, that's an avenue worth exploring. I've just had a look to see if my local council have their meetings attendance online, but they don't.

Yes FOI request to a council is an option - and they can charge - but I hoped the information would be easily available for all to see - council accounts and lists of expenses are published & easily accessible online - so it's a pity attendance records are not - though as I said some councils do publish them.

Freedom of information request? The information should be easily available on spreadsheets, I would have thought.

I think you can request the information regarding councillors attendance via a Freedom of Information application to your local council. If they can't, or won't, release the information they have to tell you why.

Thanks Iam64 - When I read that the local Labour Party had criticised Amina Lone's attendance, I thought I'd have a look at Manchester councillors' attendance record to get the facts - but I can't find it - some councils publish all the details - but most don't. So for interest I thought I'd try and find my own council's records of councillors' attendance - no way
I know this is a digression from main subject of thread but why can't we find out what our councillors are doing? Or do any Gransnetters know away of finding out?

dbDB77 whilst I agree with your sentiments about deselection, the situation with Naz Shah is different in that she's an MP not a local councillor - I suspect there must be local council elections coming up, whereas we've just had a general election so Naz is secure. She's also a hard working constituency MP, whereas the criticism of Amina Lone is that she was not a hard working local councillor. Having said all of that, I have to acknowledge, I find it difficult to accept that her de-selection isn't at least in part down to her support for Sarah Champion and for not toeing the party line 100%

Can't understand that girl, like the turkey looking forward to christmas

And Naz Shah, the Labour MP who had to apologise for making dreadful anti-Semitic posts & who criticised Sarah Champion, has liked & re-tweeted a message saying that the girls in Rotherham & elsewhere should "shut their mouths for the sake of diversity".
Yet Naz Shah hasn't been deselected.

This from Amina Lone on August 17th - now she's been deselected - coincidence? I think not.

Lone, whose was born to Pakistani parents, says she is “despairing” about Champion’s resignation because these “difficult conversations” need to be had. She says on Twitter:
“I grew up in a Muslim community where these attitudes were common. “White girls are easy” “Nobody cares about them” “They are just slags” “They parents don’t look after them properly” etc were/are still said today. I hear it regularly. Sarah Champion was talking about a particular type of grooming which is carried by men because of their cultural/religious practices. Obvs not all men. She is not a racist but a brave woman speaking out about a politically awkward issue. Labour, bury your heads as much as you like in the black & white purist world you push. The chickens will come home to roost.”

It doesn't actually say in there whether her attendance record was good or not.
If it was good compared to others, then it's wrong to stop her standing again, but there's no point in having a councillor who does not go to meetings.

Amina Lone, the Muslim Labour councillor who defended Sarah Champion has been barred from re-standing "on the grounds that her local campaign and council attendance records were not up to scratch."
"Coun Lone, who stood for Labour in Morecambe at the 2015 general election, suggested her campaigning work on gender equality in the Muslim community - particularly since the Manchester Arena attack - may have had a part to play."

www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/tensions-within-manchester-labour-erupt-13525847