Pro-Israel Labour MP Joan Ryan facing deselection for anti-Corbyn ‘smears'
2 min read
A top pro-Israel MP is facing an attempt by her local party to unseat her amid claims she has "smeared" Jeremy Corbyn.
Enfield North's Joan Ryan, who chairs the Labour Friends of Israel group, is facing a motion of no-confidence which accuses her of acting like “an independent MP in all but name” and seeking to undermine the Labour leader.
It says: "Our MP has smeared his character without him having the right to a fair and balanced defence."
Ms Ryan has been a vocal critic of Labour's handling of allegations of anti-Semitism, saying the party faces a "moral crisis" over anti-Jewish abuse.
According to the Evening Standard, the motion against her has been put forward by about 30 members of the local party with the support of its CLP secretary.
But the MP told the paper: "This is a distraction. Just three years ago I won this seat back [from the Tories] and it took a heck of a lot of hard work.
"It’s a marginal seat and this kind of distraction puts this seat at risk. What the people here need is not this kind of behaviour from a small group of party members.
"We have got a crisis, a huge growth in child poverty, county-lines drug dealing… these are the things that matter and for a small group of our members to undermine the Labour Party is divisive nonsense."
PoliticsHome Newsletters
PoliticsHome provides the most comprehensive coverage of UK politics anywhere on the web, offering high quality original reporting and analysis: Subscribe
