Sadiq Khan’s new policing deputy has apologised for calling the former Tory mayoral candidate Susan Hall a “racist” and a “climate change denier”, following claims that the “abhorrent” choice of language put Ms Hall “at risk of great physical harm”.
Kaya Comer-Schwartz, who until this month was Labour leader of Islington Council, was announced by Mr Khan as his pick to replace Sophie Linden as deputy mayor for policing and crime.
At a London Assembly hearing on Wednesday, Ms Comer-Schwartz faced tense questions over a tweet she posted in April this year, just days ahead of the mayoral election.
In the post, which was shared by Mr Khan, Ms Comer-Schwartz warned voters: “We can’t let a racist, climate change-denying Tory to be Mayor of London.”
In order to be officially confirmed into her new role at City Hall, Ms Comer-Schwartz had to win the support of the Assembly’s police and crime committee.
But matters were made awkward by the fact that the committee is chaired by Ms Hall, who told the former council leader she “resented” being called racist “by somebody who’s never met me, who doesn’t know me - as well as ‘a climate change denier’”.
She added: “I think to put things like that out, when you don’t know somebody at all, is abhorrent… This has affected me badly.”
Ms Comer-Schwartz replied: “Can I just say, chair, that I wouldn’t want to have affected you badly, and I really do deeply understand as a woman in public office, how difficult those issues are, so I would like to apologise to you, woman to woman.
“But I also would like to say that I do hope that we do get to know each other in this role, and work closely together to improve things for Londoners.”
Ms Hall was frequently accused of racism during the mayoral election both from politicians who supported Mr Khan and from groups like Hope Not Hate.
They pointed to the fact that in February 2020, she ‘liked’ a tweet with a large image of Enoch Powell and the words “It’s never too late to save your country”.
Mr Powell is famous for his 1968 ‘rivers of blood’ speech, in which he warned against immigration from the former colonies of the British Empire and sympathised with the view that in Britain “in 15 or 20 years' time, the black man will have the whip hand over the white man”.
Ms Hall had also, in January 2019, retweeted a message from the far-right activist Kate Hopkins that called Mr Khan “the nipple height mayor of Londonistan”. The latter word is a common term of Islamophobic abuse which is used to claim that Muslims have taken over London. Ms Hall added at the time: “Thank you Katie!”
Ms Hall said Hope Not Hate had put “tens of thousands of pictures all over London, with ‘RACIST’ written across my face”.
The assembly member, who also serves as a local councillor in Harrow, added: “I knock on doors and I stand and I talk to black Londoners, explaining that actually they’ve got their opinion of me through something they’ve read, which they admit to. This happened to me last week.
“Putting stuff out like that is very, very dangerous, because people automatically assume if they read it, it might be right - and this absolutely isn’t right. To be called a racist, when you know you’re not, is one of the most abhorrent things that can ever happen to you.
“We’ll move on, and thank you for your apology, but anybody else thinking that they can just do that, without knowing a person, without knowing what they believe in, they should bloody well make sure they don’t, because it’s put me in danger and it is grossly unfair.”
Ms Comer-Schwartz’s tweet was first raised in the meeting by Ms Hall’s colleague and predecessor as mayoral candidate, Lord Bailey.
He claimed that the tweet had put Ms Hall “at risk of great physical harm”, before asking how she could fulfil the role of deputy mayor in an “inclusive” way, and then suggesting that she apologise.
Ms Comer-Schwartz initially responded by saying that she was “unashamed” in stating that “people with racist views or misogynistic views or any views that would fuel or enable hate” were not fit for public office.
But she later said that she does “challenge” herself to hear other people’s views, before offering her apology to Ms Hall directly.
The suggestion that Ms Hall was a “climate change denier” gained traction after the former Labour leader Ed Miliband - now Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero - said during the mayoral election that the Tory candidate was a “flat earther” who had shared material which questioned “whether climate change is man-made”.
Mr Miliband was referring to some now-deleted social media posts by Ms Hall - in particular, one where she shared an article from the Daily Sceptic which dismissed the impact of man-made greenhouse gas emissions on climate change.
The police and crime committee resolved not to object to Ms Comer-Schwartz’s appointment but said it would write to the mayor with “concerns about her ability to scrutinise and hold the Met [Police] to account”.
