by Rob Marchant
The general consensus of the UK media is that Labour did not achieve the result it needed to last Thursday. As largely expected, it had lukewarm results in London overall and disappointing results outside.
But the most significant result of the night was surely that in Barnet, where the Tories in midterm, in London, actually regained a council that they recently lost to No Overall Control.
The reason? Unsurprisingly, the Jewish voters of Barnet, surely the council with the highest Jewish contingent in Britain, turned away from Labour in droves. Because they were fed up with Jeremy Corbyn’s failure to tackle anti-Semitism, two years after the Chakrabarti report. And, as the Jewish Chronicle’s Stephen Pollard pointed out:
Crucial point about Barnet is its not just Jewish Labour voters who have been disgusted by the party’s handling of its antisemites – it’s non Jews too.
— Stephen Pollard (@stephenpollard) May 4, 2018
Quite. While there was enough evidence from polling returns by ward, the anecdotal evidence was strong, too. Journalists deployed to the borough noted the extraordinary strength of feeling they found on the doorstep. As John Mann, chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Anti-Semitism, put it:
Those who called anti Semitism a smear cost Labour badly last night. A Jewish member for more than 60 years told me on the doorstep he couldn’t vote Labour in Barnet yesterday
— John Mann (@JohnMannMP) May 4, 2018
