From the Reading Post:
The Lib Dem councillor at the centre of the “racist” Twitter storm has been suspended from his party.
Cllr Warren Swaine quoted an Ali G catchphrase “Is it because I is black” in a tweet about mixed race Labour MP Chuka Umunna when he was appearing on Question Time…
Henk van Klaveren, Liberal Democrat national office spokesman, said: “The Liberal Democrats have a zero tolerance policy on racist comments and behaviour. The regional party has suspended Councillor Warren Swaine pending further investigation.”
And from Political Scrapbook:
With a meeting approving cuts of £65 million and 1,300 redundancies, the leader of the Conservative group on Hull City Council has landed himself in hot water by calling anti-cuts protesters in the public gallery “retards”.
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11 Comments
If he had tweeted that merely as a reference to Ali G and entirely unprompted by anything else, then this may have been acceptable. However, whether Cllr Warren Swaine is racist as a person or not, this tweet is clearly racist in its tone.
You can’t hide behind the mask of a comedian’s humour like that.
(NB I’m not going to use iPhone to comment any more. Each time I wrote “unprompted” it attempted to correct to “improvised”, to prevent correction I pressed the little “x”, which was position perfectly above the “Submit” button and appeared to press that too – grr. Stupid LDV iPhone skin!)
These are both Political Scrapbook stories 🙂
http://politicalscrapbook.net/2011/02/councillor-mocks-chuka-umunna-with-is-it-because-i-is-black-tweet/
Pending further investigation?
Don’t Councils have more important things to be doing at this time.
Wouldn’t an apology and the subsequent embarrassment and humiliation suffice as punishment?
If it had been directed at Ali Dizai…
Why are we highlighting this and how did the local press become aware of what
is an internal party matter.
I know Warren he is a hard working councillor and a Liberal to his finger tips.
This is a case of the Lib Dems shooting themselves in the foot.
Reinstate him by lifting the suspension and lets stop handing the
opposition advantages.
Personally I don’t think that was racist. A little stupid or daft to say, probably. But was it actually racist? I really don’t think so. If Frankie Boyle or Jimmy Carr had said it, then we would be taking no notice. After all we are a liberal party, obviously that means we oppose racism, but surely we support free speech too?
Well said Matt.
Can someone please explain to me why this was racist?
I’m still waiting!
@Philip
How about because Liberal Democrat national office act like a bunch of automatons, who can only follow absolute rules and haven’ t the wisdom to be able to balance different people’s liberties – i.e. the liberty to demonstrate that someone has a robust sense of humour, and the liberty for someone else to take offense.
Yep, politically correct automatons. I await the outcome of the national office’s “investigation” with interest. My conclusion is that they have made the party appear illiberal and idiotic.