Labour has expelled the secretary of the Liverpool Wavertree Party over his support for the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB).
Kevin Bean was one of four Wavertree officials suspended by Labour in May after the JC revealed how they had emailed a statement to local members attacking Paula Barker MP for an article she wrote in a local Jewish newspaper.
But the JC, along with another complainant, alerted Labour to Mr Bean’s involvement with the CPGB – to which he gave a series of speeches and for whose newspaper he wrote articles under the name of James Harvey.
A report in the CPGB’s Weekly Worker publication on October 8 confirmed that Mr Harvey was “elected to the CPGB’s PCC (Provisional Central Committee) as a candidate member, with speaking, but not voting, rights at this time. This was unanimously agreed.”
Separate CPGB YouTube videos show the same man delivering talks for the party, but under two names – Mr Bean and Mr Harvey.
The former University of Liverpool lecturer’s involvement with the far-left party stretches back to at least 2016.
The JC received confirmation of Mr Bean’s expulsion from Labour on Monday. It is understood the decision related to strict rules which state the support for another political party are incompatible with Labour Party membership.
After Labour suspended Mr Bean in May, hard-left activists launched a campaign to ‘Defend The Wavertree Four’ against what they said was a politically motivated attack.
Mr Bean – who has also been a senior figure in the Labour Against The Witch-hunt group for who he has chaired meetings – had earlier signed an email sent to Wavertree members which said local MP Ms Barker had “reiterated the inaccurate and factionally motivated position on antisemitism” which had been used to “seriously undermine Labour’s socialist program during the leadership of Jeremy Corbyn.”
They added that “the IHRA definition of antisemitism is deeply flawed. It is clearly designed to protect the Israeli state from legitimate criticism.”
The Wavertree Four campaign also claimed that after Ms Berger’s resignation from Labour in February 2019, local members “were subject to further abuse and false allegations in the media, all of which were designed to obscure the political differences between” her and the local Labour party.
Ms Barker replaced Jewish ex-MP Luciana Berger in the Wavertree seat, and in her article for the Jewish Telegraph newspaper earlier this year she said she found it “deeply regrettable” Ms Berger could not remain a member of the Labour Party.
There have been repeated calls by campaigners against antisemitism – including former deputy leader Tom Watson – for the party to launch a formal investigation into the activities of the hard-left in the local Wavertree party.
