Tory's biggest donor 'said Diane Abbott makes you want to hate all Black women'
The Tory Party's biggest donor allegedly said seeing former Labour frontbencher Diane Abbott on TV makes you “want to hate all black women”.
Millionaire businessman Frank Hester also said the former Shadow Home Secretary “should be shot”, the Guardian reports. Mr Hester, who has donated £10million to the party in the past 12 month, is claimed to have made the remark during a meeting in 2019.
It is alleged that he said seeing Ms Abbott on TV makes “you just want to hate all black women because she’s there”. It is also claimed he said he abhorred racism, but told another meeting “we take the p*** out of the fact that all our Chinese girls sit together in Asian corner”.
Rishi Sunak has been urged to return the cash donated by Mr Hester. The businessman, who runs Leeds-based healthcare firm the Phoenix Partnership (TPP) is claimed to have called his “foreign” workers together to defend himself against allegations of racism.
TPP, which has received more than £400million in NHS and other Government contracts since 2016, told the newspaper the remarks have been "distorted".
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Labour Party chair Anneliese Dodds said: “These comments are reprehensible. Frank Hester is the Conservative Party’s biggest ever donor, as well as a personal donor to the Prime Minster, it is therefore vital that Rishi Sunak and the Tories return his donations, in full without delay. Rishi Sunak has claimed that 'words matter', and he must know that holding on to that money would suggest the Conservatives condone these disturbing comments. Sunak must return every penny.”
Electoral Commission figures reveal that Mr Hester handed £5million to the Tories in May last year, and announced a further £5million this month. According to the Guardian, which has conducted a months-long investigation into Mr Hester, he said during a 2019 meeting about an executive from another company: “It’s like trying not to be racist but you see Diane Abbott on the TV, and you’re just like I hate, you just want to hate all black women because she’s there, and I don’t hate all black women at all, but I think she should be shot.
“[The executive] and Diane Abbott need to be shot. She’s stupid … If we can get [the executive] being unprofessional we can get her sacked." He then reportedly said it "would be much better if she died".
In another 2018 meeting, the Guardian claims, he called "foreign" workers into a meeting and said although he makes "a lot of jokes about racism" he thinks it is "just the most abhorrent thing". He later called on staff to be "loving and accepting of each other".
He told them, The Guardian reports, that progress would not be “based on the colour of your skin, your ethnicity, where your parents are from”.
A TPP spokesperson said: "Frank Hester accepts that he was rude about Diane Abbott in a private meeting several years ago but his criticism had nothing to do with her gender nor colour of skin. The Guardian is right when it quotes Frank saying he abhors racism, not least because he experienced it as the child of Irish immigrants in the 1970’s.
"He rang Diane Abbott twice today to try to apologise directly for the hurt he has caused her, and is deeply sorry for his remarks. He wishes to make it clear that he regards racism as a poison which has no place in public life."
A Conservative spokeswoman said: "Mr Hester has made clear that while he was rude, his criticism had nothing to do with her gender nor the colour of her skin. He has since apologised."
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