Sir Keir Starmer should be very, very worried after Galloway win

Published

2 years ago

March 1, 2024

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He’s back! The left-wing firebrand and Celtic FC fanatic George Galloway has now scored a hat-trick of election victories over Labour, the party he represented in parliament for 16 years.

After ousting Oona King in Bethnal Green and Bow in 2005 and winning a spectacular by-election in Bradford West in 2012, he has now done the treble with a stunning and controversial triumph in Rochdale.

His majority over an independent candidate, David Tully, was a comfortable 5,697, with the Conservatives third, Liberal Democrats fourth and the disowned Labour candidate Azhar Ali fifth.

Politics latest: George Galloway celebrates victory

The polls had been closed for less than an hour when the Galloway team claimed victory here. “We’ve won – comfortably,” a source close to his campaign told Sky News before 11pm. How right they were. It was indeed comfortable.

In a rousing victory speech, he denounced Labour and the Conservatives as “two cheeks of the same backside” and claimed he had put Sir Keir Starmer on notice.

He declared with characteristic Galloway passion: “Starmer, this is for Gaza. You have paid, and you will pay, a high price for the role you have played in enabling, encouraging and covering for the catastrophe currently going on in occupied Palestine in the Gaza Strip.”

He relentlessly targeted his former party during the campaign. One leaflet, showing a pugilistic Mr Galloway in his trademark fedora with raised fists and a glum-looking Labour leader, said: “It’s George Galloway or Keir Starmer’s Labour in Rochdale.”

Another was headlined: “For Rochdale, for Gaza.” It went on: “The people of Gaza don’t have a vote in this election – you do.”

And it concluded: “This election is a straight choice between George who will fight for Palestine and the people of Rochdale – and Keir Starmer, who will fight for Israel.”

But of course, strictly speaking, it wasn’t Sir Keir’s Labour Party he was fighting. The Labour candidate, Azhar Ali, was disowned by his party on 13 February after comments he made about the Hamas attacks on Israel at a meeting in Lancashire.

“The Egyptians are saying that they warned Israel 10 days earlier… Americans warned them a day before… there’s something happening,” the Mail on Sunday reported him saying.

“They deliberately took the security off, they allowed… that massacre gives them the green light to do whatever they bloody want.”

This was dismissed by the Labour leadership as a wild and antisemitic conspiracy theory – Mr Ali apologised and was dumped a few days later. But it was too late for Sir Keir to repair the damage.

Nominations had closed, which meant he was still the candidate and his name – beginning, fortuitously for him, with the letter A – remained at the top of the ballot paper.

Fat lot of good it did him, as he was pushed into fifth place, behind Mr Galloway, political virgin Mr Tully, the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats.

For Reform UK, also, it was a night to forget, with the former Labour MP for Rochdale Simon Danczuk coming a humiliating sixth, after recent good performances in by-elections that gave Rishi Sunak and the Tories the jitters.

There will be relief in the Tory high command at Reform UK’s poor showing here. For once, after a by-election, Mr Sunak will be relieved and Sir Keir horrified.

Before the result was declared, Reform UK’s leader Richard Tice launched a blistering attack live on Sky News on Mr Danczuk’s opponents. Though he didn’t name names, he appeared to be accusing Mr Galloway’s supporters and those of Mr Ali.

He said Mr Danczuk had faced “vile racist abuse and death threats”. His party’s staff had been intimidated, and they’d had to hire security guards. Business supporters had been threatened with being firebombed and there had been intimidation at polling stations, he claimed.

But in an interview with Sky News immediately after his victory speech, Mr Galloway denied any wrongdoing and said it was his supporters who had faced intimidation during the campaign.

Mr Tice also challenged the legitimacy of the very high number of postal votes cast, a claim his friend and predecessor Nigel Farage has been making in by-elections for years.

For Labour, meanwhile, when it holds its inquest into the debacle of this by-election, it will reflect on how what should have been a routine by-election win in a relatively safe seat turned into Sir Keir’s worst nightmare – a win for George Galloway.

If the Labour leader thinks he gets a hard time now from the SNP’s Westminster leader Stephen Flynn and the Corbynite Labour left over the Israel-Hamas ceasefire row, wait until the ferocious Galloway starts tearing into him in the Commons chamber.

Top of the agenda for the Labour inquest will be to identify which idiot decided to hold the by-election in such an unseemly rush after the death of veteran MP and party stalwart Sir Tony Lloyd.

There used to be a convention that a party waited until after the funeral of an MP who’d died before starting moves to select a candidate or plan for the by-election.

Yet here Labour threw convention out of the window and moved with indecent haste. Sir Tony died on 17 January and Mr Ali was selected, defeating political journalist Paul Waugh, just 10 days later, on 27 January.

Sir Tony’s funeral, however, was not until 16 February, three days after Sir Keir had been forced to jettison Mr Ali after allegations from opponents that the Labour leader dithered over how to respond to the Mail on Sunday’s initial report.

It’s not as if Labour hasn’t made this blunder before. In Hartlepool in 2021, Labour MP Mike Hill resigned on 18 March after sexual harassment allegations and Labour raced ahead with the by-election on 6 May, the same day as the local elections.

Then, Labour’s would-be candidates were only given one day to submit their applications and there were allegations of a stitch-up. The by-election was a disaster, with the Tories’ Jill Mortimer winning in a “red wall” triumph for the Conservatives.

Sir Keir responded then by sacking chief whip Nick Brown and attempting to sideline his deputy, Angela Rayner, in a clumsy reshuffle, perhaps forgetting that she was elected to her position by the party and couldn’t be sacked.

There will, surely, be more recriminations after Rochdale, which for the maverick known as “Gorgeous George”, this morning is indeed a beautiful new dawn.

There’s a real risk now that Mr Galloway will carry out his threat to stand up to 50 pro-ceasefire, anti-Israel candidates against Labour in the general election.

Chris Williamson, a Corbynite Labour ex-MP who was here at the Rochdale count supporting Mr Galloway, has told Sky News he hopes to be selected to fight the retiring grandee Margaret Beckett’s Derby South seat at the general election.

So it’s not just an election hat-trick that Mr Galloway is celebrating. He hopes to score more victories over his former party later this year, as he also declared in his victory speech.

But amid all the controversy of this campaign, Mr Galloway also claims to have made history in an even more grand manner with his victory here in Rochdale.

In his Sky News interview, he said it was his seventh parliamentary election victory in four different cities, which equals the record of Winston Churchill.

On level terms with Churchill? Modesty has never been Mr Galloway’s style, of course.

But after this hat-trick of election victories for the controversial left-wing firebrand, Sir Keir Starmer should be very, very worried indeed.

UK

Royal Navy intercepts Russian warship and tanker

Published

5 hours ago

November 23, 2025

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Royal Navy intercepts Russian warship and tanker

A Royal Navy patrol ship has intercepted two Russian vessels off the UK coast, the Ministry of Defence has said.

It comes after Defence Secretary John Healey announced last Wednesday that lasers from Russian spy ship the Yantar were directed at RAF pilots tracking it, in an attempt to disrupt the monitoring.

The MoD said on Sunday that in a “round-the-clock shadowing operation”, the Royal Navy ship HMS Severn has intercepted Russian warship RFN Stoikiy and tanker Yelnya off the UK coast in the past fortnight.

The Russian vessels sailed through the Dover Strait and westward through the English Channel, the MoD said.

HMS Severn later handed over monitoring duties to a NATO ally off the coast of Brittany, France, it said, but continued to watch from a distance and remained ready to respond to any unexpected activity.

The ministry added that the UK’s armed forces are on patrol “from the English Channel to the High North” amid increased Russian activity threatening UK waters.

Last week, Russia accused the British government of “provocative statements” after the defence secretary warned the Yantar was nearing the UK.

At a news conference in Downing Street on Wednesday, Mr Healey said the spy ship was on the edge of British waters north of Scotland, having entered wider UK waters over the last few weeks.

He said it was the second time this year the Yantar had been deployed off the UK coast and he claimed it was “designed for gathering intelligence and mapping our undersea cables”.

Mr Healey said the ship had “directed lasers” at pilots of a P-8 surveillance aircraft monitoring its activities – a Russian action he deemed “deeply dangerous”.

In a clear message to Russian President Vladimir Putin, the defence secretary said: “We see you. We know what you are doing. And we are ready.”

The ministry said while tracking the Yantar, Royal Navy frigate HMS Somerset and other civilian ships in the area “experienced GPS jamming in a further demonstration of unprofessional behaviour, intended to be disruptive and a nuisance”.

Russia’s UK embassy dismissed the accusations and insisted the Yantar is a research ship in international waters.

The defence secretary also repeated government plans to increase defence spending and work with NATO allies to bolster European security.

And he stressed how plans to buy weapons and build arms factories will create jobs and economic growth.

A report by a group of MPs, also released on Wednesday, underlined the scale of the challenge the UK faces.

It accused the government of lacking a national plan to defend itself from attack.

The Defence Select Committee also warned that Mr Healey, the prime minister and the rest of the cabinet are moving at a “glacial” pace to fix the issue and are failing to launch a “national conversation on defence and security” – something Sir Keir Starmer had promised last year.

The UK has seen a 30% increase in Russian vessels threatening UK waters in the past two years, according to the MoD.

But the ministry maintained the UK has a wide range of military options at its disposal to keep UK waters safe.

Three RAF P-8 Poseidon aircraft have deployed to Keflavik Air Base in Iceland in the largest overseas deployment of the RAF P-8 fleet so far, the MoD said.

They are conducting surveillance operations as part of NATO’s collective defence, patrolling for Russian ships and submarines in the North Atlantic and Arctic.

The operations come just weeks after HMS Duncan tracked the movements of Russian destroyer Vice Admiral Kulakov, and frigate HMS Iron Duke was dispatched to monitor Russian Kilo-class submarine Novorossiysk.

UK

Ban on Maccabi Tel Aviv fans for Aston Villa game ‘based on false hooligan claims’

Published

5 hours ago

November 23, 2025

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Ban on Maccabi Tel Aviv fans for Aston Villa game 'based on false hooligan claims'

West Midlands Police has defended the ban on Maccabi Tel Aviv fans attending an Aston Villa match after it was claimed that false intelligence was used.

Supporters of the Israeli club were barred from the Europa League fixture at Villa Park on 6 November.

West Midlands Police chief superintendent Tom Joyce told Sky News before the game that a “section” of Maccabi’s fanbase engaged in “quite significant levels of hooliganism”.

According to The Sunday Times, West Midlands Police claimed in a confidential dossier that when Maccabi played Ajax in Amsterdam last year, Israeli fans threw “innocent members of the public into the river”, and added that between 500 and 600 supporters had “intentionally targeted Muslim communities”.

The report also said 5,000 Dutch police officers had been deployed in response.

However, the Netherlands’ national police force has questioned the claims, reportedly describing information cited by its British officers as “not true” and in some instances obviously inaccurate.

Sebastiaan Meijer, a spokesman for the Amsterdam division, told The Sunday Times that he was “surprised” by allegations in the West Midlands Police report, which had linked 200 travelling supporters to the Israel Defence Forces (IDF).

Mr Meijer denied that his force had such intelligence, adding that the claim was meaningless given the country had a policy of conscription.

Also, Mr Meijer said that Amsterdam’s force “does not recognise” the claim in the British report, attributed to Dutch law enforcement, that Israelis were “highly organised, skilled fighters with a serious desire and will to fight with police and opposing groups”.

The Dutch police added that the only known case of a fan being in the river appeared to involve a Maccabi supporter. While being filmed, he was told he could leave the water on the condition that he said “Free Palestine”.

In an interview with Sky News before the game, West Midlands Police referenced disorder when Maccabi played Ajax in Amsterdam last November.

Mr Joyce said ahead of the Villa Park match: “We’ve had examples where a section of Maccabi fans were targeting people not involved in football matches, and certainly we had an incident in Amsterdam last year which has informed some of our decision-making.

“So it is exclusively a decision we made on the basis of the behaviour of a sub-section of Maccabi fans, but all the reaction that could occur obviously formed part of that as well.”

Maccabi’s visit to Birmingham came amid heightened tensions due to Israel’s war on Hamas in Gaza.

A safety advisory group (SAG) recommended that Maccabi fans should be banned from attending the fixture on the advice of the police. The ban drew criticism, and Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said it was the “wrong decision”.

West Midland Police’s statement in full

Following The Sunday Times report, West Midlands Police stood by its “information and intelligence”, adding that the “Maccabi Fanatics… posed a credible threat to safety”.

In a statement to Sky News, the force said: “West Midlands Police’s evaluation was based primarily on information and intelligence and had public safety at its heart.

“We assessed the fixture between Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv in Amsterdam as having involved significant public disorder.

“We met with Dutch police on 1 October, where information relating to that 2024 fixture was shared with us.

“Informed by information and intelligence, we concluded that Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters – specifically the subgroup known as the Maccabi Fanatics – posed a credible threat to public safety.

“The submission made to the SAG safety advisory group was based on information and intelligence which helped shape understanding of the risks.

“West Midlands Police commissioned a peer review, which was conducted by UKFPU [United Kingdom Policing Unit], the NPCC [National Police Chiefs’ Council] and subject matter experts.

“This review, carried out on 20 October, fully endorsed the force’s approach and decision-making.

“We are satisfied that the policing strategy and operational plan was effective, proportionate, and maintained the city’s reputation as a safe and welcoming place for everyone.”

Sky News has approached Dutch police for comment.

UK

Titanic couple’s pocket watch sells for record £1.78m

Published

5 hours ago

November 23, 2025

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Titanic couple's pocket watch sells for record £1.78m

A gold pocket watch that belonged to an elderly couple who drowned as the Titanic sunk has sold for a record-breaking £1.78m at auction.

The 18-carat Jules Jurgensen engraved watch was owned by first class passenger Isidor Straus, who died when the ship sank in April 1912.

He and his wife Ida were portrayed in the film Titanic as a couple who held each other as the ship went down.

When he was offered a seat on a lifeboat due to his age, he replied that he would not go before other men.

His wife refused to leave him, and the couple were last seen alive sitting on deckchairs, facing fate by each other’s side.

They were among very few first class passengers to perish in the disaster.

The watch was recovered from Mr Straus’s body along with other personal items and returned to his family.

It had been a present for his 43rd birthday in 1888 – the same year he became a partner in the New York department store, Macy’s.

The watch, which had remained in the couple’s family, was sold at Henry Aldridge & Son Auctioneers in Devizes, Wiltshire.

The £1.78m for the item is the highest amount ever paid for Titanic memorabilia, according to the company.

A letter written by Mrs Straus on Titanic stationery and posted while onboard the ship fetched £100,000.

The previous record was set last year when another gold pocket watch presented to the captain of a boat that rescued over 700 passengers from the liner sold for £1.56m.