A former Tory candidate for the Greater London Authority has told the JC he was once advised not to stand for Parliament because he was Jewish.
Ben Seifert — who left the Tories in September — claimed a member of the Hackney Conservative Association told him that it would “look like a stitch-up”.
Mr Seifert said he received a phone call from “quite an old member” (who he wished not to name) in April or May this year when he was on a shortlist of candidates for the 'unwinnable' seats of Hackney North and Stoke Newington or Hackney South and Shoreditch.
“Because all the Conservative councillors on Hackney Council are Charedi… he called me to say, ‘It will look as if it’s a sort of stitch-up if we have a Jewish candidate in Hackney South or Hackney North, and therefore I don’t think you should stand in that seat, because you can have too many Jews’.”
