Labour whistleblower reveals "terrifying number" of anti-Semitism complaints
23 July 2020, 07:49 | Updated: 23 July 2020, 08:23
Labour whistleblower reveals "terrifying number" of anti-Semitism complaints
Labour whistleblower Ben Westerman told LBC that he discovered a "terrifying number of complaints on anti-Semitism" and "a denial from the leadership that there was a problem" when he started working there.
The Labour Party has agreed to pay "substantial damages" to seven anti-Semitism whistleblowers after accepting statements made about the individuals were "defamatory and false."
The former employees sued Labour after it issued a press release describing them as having "personal and political axes to grind".
Ben Westerman was one of the seven whistleblowers, having been a member of the Labour Party's disputes resolution team in 2016.
He told LBC that his decision to reveal all in a documentary was a moral one, not a political one.
Speaking about what he found when he started working for the party, he said: "I discovered a really terrifying amount of complaints of anti-Semitism from members of the party. I really do mean scarily-high numbers of complaints.
"But what struck me more was a denialism from the leadership that there was a problem.
"And then what was documented in the documentary last year, an interference in those complaints for what I can only assume was political reasons and a refusal to deal with them."
Hear his full, fascinating interview at the top of the page.
