After a fortnight of soft-focus videos peppered with "ums" and "ers", Prime Minister Andy Burnham has lurched left. Hard left. Diane Abbott, a member of the Socialist Campaign Group, Labour's most Left-wing faction, is back in from the cold.
Abbott, 72, has been readmitted to Labour after apologising for a social media post in which she referred to the Israeli Defense Forces as the "Jewish Defence Force". Her return follows a "disciplinary process" - and the official line is that it has nothing to do with the change of prime minister. If you believe that, you'll believe your taxes won't go up under Labour.
Abbott was suspended last year after she doubled down on a claim that Jews experienced racism differently to black people. She was initially turfed out for suggesting Jewish, Irish and Traveller people "undoubtedly experience prejudice" but "they are not all their lives subject to racism" - prejudice she likened to that faced by redheads.
A disciplinary process and a return
After a "faux apology", Abbott was readmitted before the 2024 General Election, but doubled down again in an interview with the BBC, saying she did not regret her comments. She was suspended again, and her time as an independent MP has now come to an end.
She has been welcomed back alongside fellow Labour MP Joani Reid, who "voluntarily" suspended herself earlier this year after her husband was arrested on suspicion of spying for China.
Burnham has already promoted three members of the Socialist Campaign Group as ministerial aides - the first time members of the hard-left caucus, whose president is Dennis Skinner, have entered government under a Labour prime minister. He has promised to end "factionalism" and said he would not use party discipline to "stifle debate".
Antisemitism warnings
Abbott led a rebellion against proscribing Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation at a time when antisemitic hate crimes have overtaken Islamophobic incidents, with more reported abuses of Jews than Muslims. The chilling rise of open prejudice and hate in the UK has been attributed to a feeling among British Jews that they are being targeted with impunity.
Campaign Against Antisemitism said: "Not only does she herself represent a throwback to the Corbyn years when she was so prominent – the period when Labour became institutionally antisemitic according to the EHRC – but so does her readmission to the Party, whose processes were widely viewed as unfit for purpose. We were supposed to be past all this, but it seems like the moment Sir Keir Starmer makes way for Andy Burnham, Labour risks turning the clock back. Her readmission is a bad omen."
From 2010 also-ran to Downing Street
Burnham, a serial loser in Labour leadership contests, finished fourth in the 2010 contest behind Ed Miliband, David Miliband and Ed Balls - though he did come ahead of Abbott. His unopposed arrival in Downing Street was supposed to break with the shambles of the past. Instead, with Abbott back, it looks like a return to it.
