Labour Suspends MP Karl Turner After He Opposed Plan to Limit Jury Trials
Labour MP Karl Turner, a prominent vocal critic of the Government’s policy of restricting jury trials, has had the Labour whip suspended. The Mail has the story.
The Kingston upon Hull East MP, 54, has repeatedly hit out at David Lammy’s proposal to allow juries to hear only the most serious criminal cases.
Under plans being pushed through by Justice Secretary Lammy, criminal cases with a likely sentence of three years or less would not be entitled to a jury trial.
Under changes proposed in the Courts and Tribunals Bill, these would instead be heard by a single crown court judge.
The Government has faced considerable opposition from its own backbenchers, with Turner branded them “unworkable, unpopular, unjust and unnecessary”, when they were debated in the Commons earlier this month.
But he has also hit out on a variety of other issues. He questioned the circumstances around the theft of the Prime Minister’s former chief of staff Morgan McSweeney’s mobile phone and with it potentially messages to Lord Peter Mandelson.
He called the former aide to Sir Keir Starmer “McSwindle”.
The Mail understands he was told by Chief Whip Jonathan Reynolds that he was suspending the whip “following his recent conduct”.
But writing on X, Turner said: “I am being told that I have had the whip suspended but I have not had any notification from the whips about this. It seems journalists have been told but I have not.”
Worth reading in full.
The Telegraph‘s coverage adds that “earlier this month, Turner publicly warned Sir Keir that he would ‘undoubtedly’ face a leadership challenge if Labour performed as badly as expected in May’s local elections.
He told the Huffington Post: “We are incredibly frustrated both at the direction of the party since July 2024, when we were given the chance to prove that we can govern the country in the best interests of the vast majority. We cannot continue with more of the same.”
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
Cue the Beast of Bolsover, “I always work on the principle that if my heart and my head are together on an issue, write it, say it.”
I’ve seen him a few times on GB News. I disagree with him on most things, but he seems a decent man, an old fashioned Leftie. Old Labour.
So out he must go
I’m not familiar with this MP, so these comments may not be appropriate. However I hold a degree of respect for an MP of any party who is prepared to make a stand on principles of disagreement with their party line. We need different voices and perspectives in Parliament.
I also have some respect for the traditional roots of the Labour movement – those who stood up against worker exploitation and for social justice born out of Christian values. There was a change of direction in and around the ‘seventies that sought to separate the party from such roots; sadly many from that generation still hold to those values unaware that the party abandoned them a long time ago.
He was my MP until I moved out of the area; took over from John Prescott.
Never voted for him but it wasn’t as though we had a halfway decent Conservative. KT has been in place for yonks and we’ve hardly heard a peep from him until now, so Labour must have gone seriously off the rails to make him speak out (and we kind of know they have).
He has been treated shabbily but he must have known this was likely to happen.
He told the Huffington Post: “We are incredibly frustrated both at the direction of the party since July 2024, when we were given the chance to prove that we can govern the country in the best interests of the vast majority……
Well that was never going to happen in a million years. So either he is an utter fool, or a liar.
Fool. And yet here he is, standing up for the principle of innocent until proven guilty by a jury of your peers.
Show trials anyone?
Not public stonings just yet.
This comes as no surprise. This authoritarian, Marxist dictatorial government will truck no dissent.
A Labour Party spokesdroid said: “It is NOT the case that whatever General Secretary Starmerin decides is the Only Truth; if you say otherwise, we’ll throw you of the Party, and add in some Gulag time if we feel like it”.
Well, that’s an April Fool – but only just.