“The Only Option….”?

For over a year a short audio recording, purporting to be of a Newham councillor has been doing the rounds. 

We have not uplifted this audio recording, though we may. The speaker clearly appears to be saying the following, "you know, the only other option we've got left is to gas them, what Hitler did...".

This is by any standards outrageous. He doesn’t mention the Jews, but it is implicit, though of course, he may have been referring to gypsies.

Our concerns about the recording are twofold. There is alas, no context, although it is difficult to imagine what context would justify such a statement. And secondly, we are far from certain of the provenance. It has been provided to us by two separate email sources, neither of which we believe bears the true names of the senders.  

We have repeatedly contacted the councillor concerned, and offered him a space to deny or justify his words without any editing on our part, but he has chosen not to respond.

We might simply have sat on it. Newham Labour Group are merrily tearing themselves apart without the need for any outside help. However, given the current crisis in Labour over its ingrained antisemitism and in Newham Labour in particular, there seemed to be a greater responsibility to share it than to hide it.

If the Chief Whip would like to contact us, we’d be happy to share a copy with him, that is if Cllr Lofthouse gives him permission.

There is a second recording which appears to be the same councillor offering derogatory remarks about Mayor Fiaz. Perhaps the Whip would like to have a copy of that as well.

We would welcome contact from anyone with first-hand knowledge of the recordings.

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