EX LORD MAYOR IN RACISM ROW

27-04-2009

Former Birmingham Lord Mayor Mahmood Hussain has denied telling a potential Labour candidate that he couldn’t support her because she was “white and Jewish”.

Allegations first surfaced on The Stirrer website over the weekend that party worker Elaina Cohen had sought his backing in her bid to win selection for the Lozells and East Handwsworth seat.

This will be vacated next year, after Cllr Kim Brom recently announced she was stepping down (see link here).

Our investigations have established that Hussain has been accused of turning down Cohen, because she was “white and Jewish”. The implication was that the Muslim support marshalled by Hussain - who is also a Lozells and East Handsworth councillor - would refuse to back her on grounds of both her religion and gender.

When we put the allegation to Hussain he insisted it wasn’t true but refused to comment further until he was aware of the specific details of the complaint.

Cohen also refused our invitation to talk but confirmed that a complaint had been made about a comment to both the City Council and the Labour party.

Birmingham City Council says it has received a complaint and is now investigating.