IT’S just over a week since Chris Williamson spoke to hundreds of Derby people at our City’s Silk Mill Festival about the need to fight for fairness and justice, against racism and bigotry of all types and for the need to support each other in these hard times. 

Now, as a result of these views, he finds himself again the victim of unfairness and injustice.

After allegations of anti-semitism led to his suspension from the Labour Party, he was investigated and reinstated, to the fury of those who want to get rid of him — and others in the Labour Party that they hate for trying to return the party to its socialist roots. 

Williamson puts the interests of ordinary people first, unlike others who kow-tow to the rich and powerful. That’s his real “crime,” if they were honest!

Who in Derby could believe Williamson is anti-semitic or in any way racist? 

Even the very few who have jumped on the bandwagon to undermine him don’t really believe it. 

Quite the opposite — Williamson has always spoken up loud and clear against bigotry and discrimination and, as deputy leader of the City Council, he was, for example,  personally instrumental in getting Holocaust Memorial activities established in Derby, working on this alongside the city’s Jewish community. 

As councillor, Labour Group leader and MP, he’s always stood up for all Derby’s working class.

What did he say in his speech in Sheffield that has been distorted to smear him? He said that anti-semitism and racism exist in all spheres of life and in all political parties and that they have to be vigorously opposed. 

Then he pointed out that the Labour Party had been more rigorous in this than any other party and was continuing with this — and therefore should not be quite so apologetic about its record. Is that anti-semitism? 

But those who want to get rid of Williamson for other reasons had enough in those few words to distort, misrepresent and smear. It’s all in a day’s work for politicians such as them.

So why do they hate him? Because those MPs don’t share his priorities and, like most politicians over the last half century, choose to ignore working-class people — and listen only to business leaders, the City and the media chattering class. 

They tried and failed to turn working people against the Labour leadership’s policies, so now they attack them personally.

But Williamson is the choice of Derby North people. There will be a general election soon, and the people should have the right to choose again. 

But the people who smear Williamson want to prevent him from standing in the next election for the Labour Party. 

The process of deciding candidates is under way, and Williamson’s “critics” want to stop him from being considered — so they want him out of the way while that process takes place. Politics is a dirty game.

This attack on Williamson is an attack on all the ordinary people of Derby for whom he is a tireless advocate. 

And it’s an attack on democracy aimed at stopping them from having the choice to vote for him again.

Williamson is one of a rare breed — an honest and straightforward politician who speaks up against austerity and for the need for a fundamental and irreversible shift of wealth and power in favour of the working class, as he said at the Silk Mill Festival. 

That’s why the currently rich and powerful hate him, want to destroy him politically and personally, and have spread a completely undeserved smear against him that they hope will do the trick.

We can’t allow it to happen. Don’t let them scare you into silence — speak up for Chris!