‘Failure to condemn racist violence shows Kemi Badenoch is unfit for office’

Stansted resident Daniel Brett says that when racists and fascists started attacking communities two weeks ago in a rolling riot across England and Northern Ireland, he sought the opinions of his MP, Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative member for North West Essex...

I was looking for a message of concern about the welfare of those being targeted – Muslims and refugees – as my son is mixed race. While neither of his parents are Muslims, his skin colour would deem him to be in the eyes of those neckless, coke-snorting fiends rampaging through communities.

I looked to Ms Badenoch, a person of colour, for condemnation, since it was not just people of colour like her who were being targeted but anyone associated with them in any way – immigration services, hotel staff, Citizens Advice workers – as well as the police who were defending them.

I wanted to hear her personal story, since all people of colour will have faced some form of racism, in one form or another.

I wanted to hear a message of hope and to show that she cares.

I wanted to hear her state that any debates over immigration should never stray into violence and that the knife attacks on children in Southport that left three little girls dead could never be used as justification for collective revenge against refugees nor used to support a misinformation war against Muslims, fuelled by the foreign billionaire Elon Musk.

Condemning racial violence is not hard. Other Conservative MPs for Essex, James Cleverly and Priti Patel, did not hesitate.

Mr Cleverly, who is Shadow Home Secretary, said the riots are “the actions of people … responding to disinformation online” and “motivated by racism”, and that the attacks on mosques and hotels were “clearly driven by racism and should be condemned unequivocally right across the board”.

Ms Patel said the riots were “thuggery, violence, racism” and, relating to her own experience of racism, that she would not feel safe in some of the areas and communities where this has been seen.

A former Home Secretary, Ms Patel also confronted Reform leader Nigel Farage’s goading of the police and dismissing his lies about “two-tier policing” as officers were faced with a life-threatening attacks.

Ms Badenoch said nothing of reassurance. Her social media revealed nothing about her thoughts on the most serious violent unrest since 2011, only statements in support of her leadership ambitions.

In an interview with The Telegraph, she engaged in collective gaslighting of the Muslim community, suggesting “integration” was the problem.

What do people of colour need to do, as individuals, to ensure they are not head-stomped by “patriots” in a street in Belfast, have their shops looted in Liverpool or their mosques attacked in Hartlepool?

She chucked out the word ‘integration’ without explanation, in lieu of clear moral leadership in political discourse against misinformation, prejudice and violent hatred that is terrorising millions who feel targeted.

She comes across as a coward in the face of a very clear moral choice about what side of the barricades she is on.

She wants to be Tory leader and presumably a future prime minister. Her mealy-mouthed statement, her gaslighting and her failure to condemn fascist street violence show she is unfit for public office, let alone leadership of any kind.

This is not about ideology, it is about upholding human decency, tolerance, compassion and peace in our society.

I will never consider her as my MP.

This reader’s letter by Daniel Brett is published in the Bishop’s Stortford Independent of August 14.