For those who didn’t catch my interview with @cathynewman last week (starts at 08:22) on Kelvin Hopkins resignation from the @UKLabour 2 weeks before the NCC hearing was meant to reconvene and my experience of the Labour Party's complaint procedure. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/radio/show/20210108-5928/2021-01-08

Key things I discussed with Cathy:
1- The current Labour Party's complaint procedure is not fit for purpose and serious reforms are needed in order for other survivors to have faith in the system and come forward.

2-The length of time to deal with the allegations: This is really really important. Please do not prolong the process for the complainants. It took the party 2.5 years to hold my NCC hearing (August 2019) despite the fact that the NEC had referred the case to the NCC in Dec 2018

3-This can have a detrimental effect on those who come forward and make a complaint. This delay had a huge impact on my life. I had to defer my Masters course, miss out on a number of job opportunities, even lost a job once when I disclosed this case to my line manager.

4- Under the current system, the Labour Party appoints lawyers for you to represent you once your case is referred to the NCC. This is not right and would not lead to a fair representation. Despite the fact that I had a pro bono barrister, he was not allowed to represent me.

5- During the NCC hearing in Aug 2019, Kerry McCarthy and myself gave our testimony and were put forward questions by Hopkins barrister. Kerry was questioned on Saturday and I spent the whole of Sunday being cross examined by the NCC panel. I was cross-examined for 8 hours.

6-Hopkins team including his barrister kept using delaying tactics so that Hopkins wouldn't have to testify which they succeeded sadly - they threatened the party with an injunction if they had not allowed them to question me all day.

7-I was asked questions like: Are you a fantasist? Was it Alastair Campbell and Jess Philipp's idea to make this complaint? Have you ever had any jobs that weren't political? It was basically a character assassination. They even asked the NCC panel to access my medical records.

8-One of my angers over this is that, the NCC panel allowed this to happen and did not even provide support for someone who had been sexually assaulted and harassed and the fact that a Labour MP, Kerry had gone through the same experience.

9- Usually NCC hearings are concluded within a day or two but despite spending a whole weekend at the Labour Party HQ (we were there until 12 am Monday morning), this hearing was not concluded and in my opinion Hopkins should have been expelled from the party and he wasn't.

10-In fact, he was allowed to quietly to step down in the run up to the 2019 General Election.

11-The party had promised to resume with the hearing a few weeks after the August hearing but they never did - they gave lots of excuses - a number of the NCC panels were too busy, either on holiday or were going through the selection process. Basically, we were not the priority.

12-During his leadership, @jeremycorbyn didn't even acknowledge that what Kelvin Hopkins did was wrong and that he should not have promoted him to the Shadow Cabinet in 2016. Neither Kerry nor myself received an apology for this.

13-When Corbyn left, the new Labour Leader, @Keir_Starmer re-opened the case but Hopkins probably knew he was finished so he quit the party two weeks before the hearing was meant to reconvene.

For the sake of the survivors and the reputation of the
@UKLabour, please sort out this broken system.