Appendix 5

The Tory attack on Diane Abbott analysed

The Tories produced a video attacking Diane by extracting just 52 of her words from the 2,500 in an interview with Andrew Marr on Sunday May 28. Because the average viewing time for online videos of this kind is usually not much more than ten seconds, the passage we were most concerned about was the one the Tories edited to open the video. The effect was to give the false impression that Diane had specifically opposed the banning of Al Qaeda in 2001 (when the issue was the blanket proscription of 21 organisations, some of which she thought could be considered dissident rather than terrorist groups).

The following is the full text of that passage with the words the Tories left out in italics:

Marr: Let me come onto your bit, you said, nobody votes against these kinds of things without a lot of thought. Shortly before 9/11 you voted against proscribing Al Qaeda as an organisation. That was a huge mistake on your part was it not?

Diane: Have you actually read the legislation we were voting on?

Marr: I have read the legislation and I’ve looked at the addendums as well

Diane: And what the legislation brought forward was a whole list of…

Marr: Which I have here.

Diane: Organisations, some of which some people would argue were not terrorist organisations but dissident organisations. And to say that because I…..

Marr: Which ones, because I’ve got the list here. Al Qaeda, Egyptian Islamic Jihad, the Armed Islamic Group, Harakat Mujahideen, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Islamic Army of Aden, the Abu Nidal organisation, the Kurdistan Workers Party, which of these should not be proscribed?

Diane: Titles are one thing, but the reality of some of those groups (was) that they were dissidents in their country of origin, and that’s why some of us were not – had they taken Al Qaeda as one thing, that would have been something. But you know….

Marr then continues to press Diane on which organisations she was against proscribing and puts the list in front of her saying: “I’m just wondering which ones you think are okay.” To this she replies: “it’s not that I thought they were okay – I thought that they were dissident organisations.”

Putting it round the other way, here is the attack video transcript, i.e. the above without the words in italics. It starts with the voice of BBC presenter Andrew Marr, who is out-of-vision, saying: “Shortly before 9/11….” Then Marr comes into view with the words, ‘you voted against proscribing Al Qaeda as an organisation.’

The sequence continues:

Diane: The legislation brought forward was a whole list of…

Marr: Which I have here.

Diane: Organisations.

Marr: Al Qaeda, Egyptian Islamic Jihad, the Armed Islamic Group, Harakat Mujahideen, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad… Which of these should not be proscribed?

Then a black-on-white graphic comes up with: ‘She would be in charge of tackling terrorism.’

The unedited passage from the interview lasts about 90 seconds. The Tory extracts last just over 15 seconds. The claim that Diane had ‘voted against banning Al Qaeda just before 9/11’ is established in the opening seconds and only 10 of Diane’s words are used.