Communities Secretary Steve Reed has revealed that a “Jewish colleague” was refused permission to visit a school in his own constituency, after officials cited fears his presence might “inflame teachers.”
In conversation with Jewish News news editor and publisher Justin Cohen, the senior minister told an audience at the Jewish Labour Movement’s annual conference that his colleague, believed to be an MP, had been “refused permission to visit a school in his own constituency in case his presence inflames the teachers.”
Reed revealed:” What I’m talking about is identifying those places where antisemitism festers and grows so we can root it out.
“That is absolutely what we have to do. But we are far away from that point right now, far away.
“I give you any number of examples….. I have a colleague who is Jewish, who has been banned from visiting a school and refused permission to visit a school in his own constituency, in case his presence inflames the teachers. That is an absolute outrage.”
Asked what his response had been to this incident, Reed said:”They will be called in, and they will be held to account for doing that, because you cannot have people with those kinds of attitudes teaching our children. You just can’t have it.”
