THE Oxford University Labour Club said a high-profile MP has ‘failed to uphold the anti-racist views’ of the party and an inquiry should be opened into his behaviour.

It voted that Chris Williamson, a prominent left-wing MP and supporter of Jeremy Corbyn, had ‘dismissed’ allegations of anti-Semitism in the Labour Party as ‘proxy wars’ in a Guardian interview last year.

The club voted that comments Mr Williamson had made implied that anti-Semitism ‘was a targeted smear campaign against Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party, rather than a legitimate issue which might arise within the party and its membership’.

The club will now release an official statement publicly condemning Mr Williamson and repeat a call for disciplinary action to be taken against him.

Amongst comments made by Mr Williamson, he said in April: “I have seen evidence of right-wing trolls, who are setting themselves up as pro-Labour, pro-Jeremy Corbyn individuals, on social media, who claim to be Labour supporters and have then used that platform to make anti-Semitic remarks.”

The university club will now ask its co-chairs to write to Jennie Formby, the general secretary of the Labour Party, Nick Brown, the Labour Party’s chief whip in the House of Commons and John Cryer, the chairman of the Parliamentary Labour Party, to call for an inquiry into his behaviour and language.