Labour MP Rupa Huq suspended after calling Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng ‘superficially’ black

Huq has offered the Chancellor ‘sincere and heartfelt apologies’ for her ‘ill-judged’ comments
WEST END FINAL

Get our award-winning daily news email featuring exclusive stories, opinion and expert analysis

I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard. Read our privacy notice.

Labour MP Rupa Huq has been suspended by the Labour party after she described Kwasi Kwarteng as “superficially” black.

In audio published online, Ms Huq can be heard discussing the Chancellor’s private school background, before adding that “you wouldn’t know he is black” when listening to him on the radio.

The comments from the Ealing Central and Acton MP were made at a fringe event at the Labour Party conference in Liverpool on Monday.

A Labour party spokesman confirmed she had had the whip removed on Tuesday afternoon.

The spokesman said: “We obviously condemn the remarks she made, they are totally inappropriate and we would call on her to apologise and withdraw them.”

The MP later apologised to Mr Kwarteng for the comments, which she said were “ill-judged”.

“I have today contacted Kwasi Kwarteng to offer my sincere and heartfelt apologies for the comments I made at yesterday’s Labour conference fringe meeting,” she tweeted.

“My comments were ill-judged and I wholeheartedly apologise to anyone affected.”

Earlier this month, Mr Kwarteng became Britain’s first black Chancellor.

Tory party chairman Jake Berry raised his “serious concerns” about the remarks in a letter to Sir Keir Starmer.

“I trust you will join me in unequivocally condemning these comments as nothing less than racist and that the Labour whip be withdrawn from Rupa Huq as a consequence,” he wrote.

Ms Huq was said to be sitting next to Labour chairwoman Anneliese Dodds when she made the remarks.

Ms Huq could be heard saying about the Chancellor: “Superficially he is a black man.

“He went to Eton, I think, he went to a very expensive prep school, all the way through, the top schools in the country.

“If you hear him on the Today programme, you wouldn’t know he is black.”

Mr Berry said that Sunder Katwala, who was chairing the event for the British Future and Black Equity organisations, was forced to challenge her remarks.

According to the Tory MP, Mr Katwala said that the Chancellor’s Conservative views “doesn’t make him not black … and I think the Labour Party has to be really careful”.

Shadow Foreign Secretary David Lammy told the BBC he would not have made the comments describing them as “unfortunate”.

He said he hoped Ms Huq would “stand those comments done”.

Deputy Labour leader Angela Rayner also called for Ms Huq to apologise for the remarks.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in