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LONDON — Senior women in the Labour Party have demanded extra protection for staff after an adviser who sexually harassed a young intern was allowed to keep his job.
POLITICO reported Wednesday that a party aide will remain in post despite a groping complaint against him being upheld twice — by parliamentary investigators and, separately, by Labour after a probe which ran for three years.
The case again shines a spotlight on the way misconduct allegations are handled in Westminster, following a series of episodes in which complainants expressed dissatisfaction with the process.
The outcome of the parliamentary investigation involving the aide was made known to his employer, who is a member of Keir Starmer’s front bench team, according to two people close to the process.
Labour declined to say whether the aide’s boss was informed that its own internal investigation had also upheld the complaint, and the employer’s office declined to comment.
MP Stella Creasy, a prominent campaigner for women’s rights in parliament, told POLITICO: “It’s deeply troubling that this case shows we could be employing people who have been found to abuse their position.”
She called for procedures to be put in place so that parliamentary passholders are automatically notified if their staff are involved in such cases “in order to ensure that they can fulfil their responsibilities for safeguarding.”
At least one shadow minister said they would be raising the case with party bosses.
However, any decision to dismiss a member of staff for misconduct would ultimately lie with their direct employer, the same shadow minister said, rather than the party.
Labour’s rule book shows that the sanction applied to the man in question — a final warning — is one in a range of options which could have included his suspension or expulsion as a member.
The woman who made the complaint has said she felt let down by both the man who harassed her and the party. POLITICO is aware of other allegations against the same aide.
Labour MP Charlotte Nichols said on Twitter the failure to dismiss him was an “example of Westminster’s tolerance of sexual harassment,” adding: “I’m ashamed that (yet again) my own party’s actions don’t match our rhetoric on higher standards.”
Her colleague Rosie Duffield, added: “This is not ok. And I expect to hear it loudly condemned by my colleagues and leader.”
Asked about the case in the weekly briefing for Westminster reporters, Starmer’s spokesman insisted the party has a zero tolerance approach to sexual harassment and that the case had been dealt with by “a thorough, robust, independent process.”
Pat McFadden, Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, told ITV that while he couldn’t comment on the individual case, the Shadow Victims Minister Jess Phillips is “fighting for better treatment for victims of violence against women and girls, and she’ll have the whole Labour Party behind her when she does that.”
A Labour spokesperson insisted the party “treats all complaints of sexual misconduct very seriously,” and that all complaints are “fully investigated.”
