Member

I do not want people to think that such things happen across the board in my constituency or borough, and to racialise the issue, because election officials have also been harassed and intimidated in places such as York, which is very different from my constituency. My plea to colleagues across parties is this: let us not racialise this issue and demonise whole communities because of the bad actions of certain individuals who do not believe in democracy and want to threaten and intimidate the vast majority of people in a community. Let us not demonise the wider community because of the actions of those people; let us make sure they are properly prosecuted with the full force of the law, and that the state ensures that people do not think they can threaten and intimidate candidates and citizens.