2 min read
I have just (belatedly) seen one of the more pointless blogs on Kaminski-gate.
Despite making Aliyah and settling in Modi’in earlier this year, former Barnet Tory councillor Richard Weider is still sticking his oar in whenever a chance to slap Labour comes up.
There has been plenty written about the Conservatives’ European partners in the past week. You don’t need me to recap whether Mr Kaminski does or does not wear the symbol of a totalitarian group or what the members of the Latvian Fatherland and Freedom party get up to every year.
My problem on this occasion is with ex-Edgware ward representative Mr Weider. Here is a man who has chosen to leave London for Israel for a new way of life. I have no grievance with his decision. Two of my acquaintances made Aliyah just yesterday. Good luck to all of them, Mr Weider included. I have no doubt life in Modi’in is extremely enjoyable.
But his blog is ridiculous. Not content with apparently blaming Labour for an increase in antisemitic attacks in the past 12 years, he goes on to label one cabinet member as an outright antisemite and another as a sympathiser for Islamic extremism.
He also claims Foreign Secretary David Miliband commented on the Kaminski affair a fortnight ago as “a last effort to try and win the election in Hendon and Golders Green”.
Yes, I’m sure as Mr Miliband sat back at his desk in the Foreign Office his only thought was: “Ha, if I say Kaminski is a nasty man then Mr and Mrs Goldberg are sure to put a cross next to Andrew Dismore or Alison Moore’s names six months from now.”
Don't make me laugh.
This is not the first time Mr Weider has made such ludicrous remarks about antisemitism.
Shortly before leaving for Israel he wrote to every constituent in his ward telling them that rising levels of antisemitism in England meant “Jews no longer always feel comfortable living as Jews and supporting Israel”.
Perhaps we don’t always feel comfortable. But this was a guy who had been living and working as a councillor in north west London, with one of the highest number of Jewish constituents of any elected representative in Britain.
Had he been sitting in a ward in Blackburn, Stoke, or Bradford, I’d hazard a guess he might have found life as a Jewish councillor a fair deal more uncomfortable. To suggest Jewish people would not feel safe walking the streets of Hendon or Edgware is complete and utter nonsense.
Mr Weider never hit the headlines while serving the good people of Barnet. What influence he believes he can have now he has gone is beyond me. Perhaps he has had too much Modi’in sunshine.
He should stick to concentrating on his new life in Israel, rather than muddying the waters between pretty pointless Town Hall politics and the Brussels bedfellows chosen by the potential next Prime Minister.
When the curtain falls it’s time to get off the stage.