A Jewish campaign group says the council is refusing to investigate its complaint it was “censored” during a council meeting.
Jewish and Proud’s deputation to Brighton and Hove City Council (BHCC) – a five-minute speech to councillors – was edited by officers before the meeting, and its presenter Susan Sheftz was interrupted when she insisted on reading out the group’s original wording.
The group submitted a formal complaint but was told by the council this would not be pursued because a “full explanation” had already been given.
However, Jewish and Proud say it has never been given any explanation, and believe this refers to a meeting with a different Jewish community group, the Sussex Jewish Representative Council (SJRP), which it was excluded from.
Meanwhile, a statement addressing events at the meeting which the council told the SJRP would be published on its website has still not materialised.
The original wording of Jewish and Proud’s deputation, about rising antisemitism, included criticism of Labour’s recognition of Palestine on the basis it legitimises Hamas, and an insistence that the war in Gaza is not genocide and that it is antisemitic to compare it to the Holocaust.
In her complaint, Mrs Sheftz said: “At the council meeting, the mayor interrupted me mid-speech and insisted I revert to the censored version (of the deputation).
“This occurred in a hostile environment, with a large anti-Israel protest outside the building for which no prior warning was given.”
An email exchange seen by the Local Democracy Reporting Service shows the council’s monitoring officer had asked for about 300 words to be cut as the original wording would “polarise” the community at a sensitive time.
The meeting was scheduled at the end of the Jewish high holiday season, after ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas, on the day of release for the last 20 living Israeli hostages following the October 7 attack.
The council’s email said: “In this case, the monitoring officer has taken into account the current significant concerns locally regarding community cohesion and community safety and has noted that there are different perspectives being shared by different groups at the council meeting.
“In order to enable the different perspectives to be aired and for your key asks to be put, the monitoring officer has advised the mayor that the shorter version of the deputation may be presented and not the original wording.
“This approach has been taken because your original wording contained statements which would likely polarise communities at this extremely sensitive time.”
In responding to Mrs Sheftz’s complaint after the meeting, the council said: “nothing further can be achieved via investigation through the council’s complaints procedure”.
By this time, the council had met with the Sussex Jewish Representative Council (SJRC) and discussed the events of the stormy council meeting.
The full council meeting was adjourned three times, first during the Jewish and Proud deputation and later during a Green Party motion asking for a report into which of the council’s pension investments may violate international law,
Jewish and Proud said: “They proposed a meeting without the people who wrote the deputation, who were most intimately involved. We were not answered.
“The day of the meeting we were told it was invited people only and we could not come. They would only have the people present who would not push back.”
A spokesperson for the SJRC, which is made up of delegates from 22 organisations and synagogues, said: “The SJRC had been in discussion with BHCC before the full council meeting, hoping that we could avoid the bigoted, disrespectful display we all witnessed that evening.
“We did not have a deputation to speak at the meeting because it fell on a Jewish High Holy Day. The insensitive timing of the meeting was also an issue we raised with the council.
“The meeting with the leader of the council and its CEO was, in fact, a postponed meeting to discuss the community impact of the terrorist attack in Manchester on Yom Kippur, which left two Jewish men dead.
“In the interim, the full council meeting took place and SJRC wrote to Jess Gibbons and Bella Sankey to express our outrage at what had taken place.
“When we finally met, it was to discuss a number of issues that had occurred, their impact on the local Jewish community and the safety and security of the community in the city in general.”
A council spokesperson told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “There are times when, at the mayor’s discretion and following advice from the monitoring officer, people bringing deputations to full council may be asked to read out the exact wording of a deputation.
“The full council meeting in October was one such occasion and the individuals bringing the deputation were clearly informed of this in writing in advance of the meeting.”
A statement from the Green Party said the motion and speeches were evidence-based and reflected the views of respected international and Israeli human rights organisations, including B’Tselem, Amnesty International, and the United Nations Human Rights Council
Councillor Ollie Sykes who put forward the motion, said: “As a party, we have been clear that we stand firmly against hate in all forms.
“That includes the vile anti-Semitic abuse which was hurled at a Jewish Green Party member in the public gallery at Hove Town Hall during the October meeting of council.”
This will be interpreted through whatever lens people already hold.
Labour censoring people! Well I never. Im surprised two tier himself wasn’t there.
My point proven, instantly.
My point proven, instantly!
Benji will be interpreted through what ever lens people hold ….
Why even comment ?
Have you been to Poland?
Or just Google it
Complaining because the want to deny war crime took place……..
Agreed is a distraction from should Brighton & Hove council follow international law or continue to fund companies that profit an on going genocide. Appears a missed opportunity to inform the council of Jewish companies that are in line with the reported aims of the uk Government for Israel and Palestine.
So Jewish people speaking up about matters of genuine vital concern are polarising. What planet is the monitoring officer on? The aggression aimed at Jewish people before and during that meeting made for uncomfortable listening and viewing. So much for tolerance in our city and our council. It was and remains a shameful episode. The snarling later in the evening, especially by those who appeared to support Hamas, compounded the show of hate and disrespect. I’m as appalled as anyone by the massacre on October 7 and the scale of violence in response but it really ought to be possible to debate these things without turning it into a circus of hate as our council has managed to do. The Jewish speaker who the council tried to gag and censor is one of the few to have shown dignity and restraint. The attempt to silence her and bowlderise her message backfired and has proved far more polarising than allowing her to spell out her position. At least though we can see the council’s true colours. Shameful stuff.
I don’t doubt the strength of feeling here or the impact the evening had on people, but it’s important to separate that from what actually happened. The concern was with the additional words that it was judged likely to (and proven even by the one line she did speak) to inflame an already difficult meeting. The content would have been inflammatory whichever group said them, right?
There were moments of unacceptable hostility in the gallery; no argument here, and we can recognise the distress felt without drifting the narrative. I’ve realised speaking with various people; that there is a misunderstanding – a deputation is not a format for debate, and maybe some of that feeling of being gagged is because of that perception?
Benjamin, with respect, you’re missing the point entirely. This isn’t about “inflammatory words” — it’s about the council cutting Mrs Sheftz’s deputation by half before the meeting and trying to force her to read their version. Despite the Mayor’s interruptions, and with admirable tenacity, Mrs Sheftz read out her full speech word for word. Whichever way you or others at BHCC choose to slice it, the councils actions were unprecedented, unconstitutional, and deeply disrespectful.
A deputation exists precisely so residents can speak directly to councillors. To censor political speech because it “might polarise” is not just clumsy, it’s anti-democratic. The issue here isn’t debate etiquette; it’s that the council attempted to censor a lawful deputation, setting a shocking precedent for resident engagement. Process, rights, and accountability matter — and this council got all three wrong.
Benjamin, you say “The concern was with the additional words that it was judged likely to (and proven even by the one line she did speak) to inflame an already difficult meeting. The content would have been inflammatory whichever group said them, right?” – yet Mrs Sheftz read all her lines. Listen to them on the webcast (or read them printed in the Jewish Chronical). Are you suggesting her words were in danger of inflaming or invoking hurty feelings among local Hamas supporters? Tell me, who is it that might be inflamed when Mrs Sheftz spoke about how Jewish residents perceive the accusation of ‘genocide’ levelled at Israel?
And how are you able to defend the ‘concerns’ the council had about exacerbating community tension, which (the council says) motivated their actions, when there were no interruptions from the Mayor during the speech given later in the meeting by Cllr Sykes?
Adrian, it still feels like you’re framing this as political speech being suppressed, but a deputation isn’t a general right to deliver a political address. It’s a regulated procedural mechanism.
The fact Mrs Sheftz managed to read beyond the agreed wording doesn’t show the council lacked authority. If anything, it illustrates how difficult it is to maintain order once a meeting is already highly charged. As Atticus puts it, letting things run unchecked is how you drift towards disruption rather than meaningful participation, mob rule.
On the comparison with Cllr Sykes: councillors speaking within a motion are not comparable to deputations. They operate under different standing orders, accountabilities, and expectations.
I do agree that the communication afterwards was mishandled and that this worsened perceptions. But describing what happened as unconstitutional or anti-democratic is not accurate, nor does it reflect how these processes actually work in practice.
To censor on the basis that not doing so may ‘inflame’ the meeting’, (essentially to potentially hurt certain peoples’ feelings), is very dangerous territory. This city has a larger than average share of serial protestors and compulsive virtue signallers. These traits and the over sensitivity generated by them should not be confused with genuine reasons for censorship.
Unfortunately, some members of the Labour party (but by no means all of them), do have a history of not being very receptive to Jewish sensibilities. These poorly thought through actions will do them no service at all in the eyes of the wider population. The same can be said for the councillors and council officers involved.
It is acceptable to disagree with a position held or expressed by a person/organisation, but you must hear what they have to say firstly. Being afraid of the use of words to the extent that you seek to use your democratically awarded power to prevent them being said should be a cause of great concern to everyone whatever their idealogical or political persuasion.
You make an excellent point on caution on censorship, in the abstract it is absolutely not a sufficient reason to suppress speech in a democracy. If councils started silencing anything that upset people, we really would be in dangerous territory.
I think where we diverge slightly is that the issue isn’t about protecting people from hurt feelings, and it’s not about fear of words. To reiterate, deputations aren’t a free-speech forum, they’re a tightly regulated part of a meeting, and officers are legally required to manage foreseeable disorder and adjournment risk.
That doesn’t mean disagreement is or should be unwelcome. It just means the format isn’t a debate, and expanded geopolitical assertions were always going to derail a meeting that was already on a knife-edge, which we saw even from the 10-second diversion. There is no evidence in the transcript or the handling that this decision was motivated by Jewish sensibilities being inconvenient, but rather than by fear of a meeting collapsing under already extreme tension, described by Yassir above.
I take on board your points, but what you are saying sounds dangerously close to essentially, facilitating mob rule. Hysterics shouting loudly should not be able to dictate to council officers and other parties at the deputation what is permitted to be said. If a person(s) is unwilling to listen quietly without resorting to disrupting proceedings, surely the legal obligation on the officers is to exclude them from the meeting and have them escorted from the premises. Emotions cannot be permitted to disrupt due process. Our democratic processes rely on this principle.
Absolutely, and it can so easily tip into mob rule too; especially when it is reacted to rather than pre-emptively managed. Acorn are a good example in recent memory.
I think we also have to acknowledge the human element here. These aren’t abstract debates for many of the people speaking, we have to respect the grief, fear and anger about the horrific events. Light-touch, pre-emptive calming allows their voice to be heard; respects the strength of feeling that comes with a topic like this; and stop it from tipping into something that benefits nobody; because once that boils over, nobody is heard.
Though very welcome, what this article underplays is just how shocking and unprecedented the Council’s actions were. No deputation in Brighton & Hove’s recent history has been so brutally censored by officers before a meeting — let alone slashed by 300 words on the grounds that its viewpoint – that of Jewish residents – might “polarise”. More extraordinary still, the Mayor attempted to order the resident to read only the Council’s edited version, something completely outside her powers and contrary to democratic practice. And now the Monitoring Officer has refused to even log, let alone investigate, the corporate complaint submitted by Mrs Sheftz, claiming the matter has been “fully explained” — referring, it seems, to a meeting held with an entirely different organisation to which the complainant was not invited. If true, this would be an astonishing breach of process. Whatever one’s views on Israel/Gaza, Brighton & Hove residents should be alarmed that the Council appears more willing to suppress a lawful deputation than to examine its own conduct.
I’d like to correct a few aspects here Adrian, as I know you always talk passionately and from good faith. The principle is entirely lawful and precedented (Mawbey 2019; Pratchett 2021) even if the cutting was unusually quite deep.
The Mayor is absolutely entitled to order the resident to read only the edited version, and is completely inside her powers as chair and in line with democratic practice – I’m afraid you are completely mistaken on this point. It’s quite literally the role of that position in a meeting. I think it is a common misconception that deputations are like a public Q&A; they are not. But, I wouldn’t expect many people to casually know what the constitutional framework for deputations are either., which absolutely feeds into the perceived issue.
Refusing to log the complaint is not actually a breach either. Complaints procedures do not apply to constitutional decisions, only to service failures or maladministration, and following the pretty clearly written in complaints policy, this was not the case here, so I would gently say that it isn’t about unwillingness to self-scrutinise.
But, to be fair, you do have a point around the communication failure, which was…clumsy at best and clearly wasn’t handled well, but the mayor enforcing the agreed wording isn’t outside her powers. That’s standard practice across the UK.
Hi Benjamin – thanks for engaging. A few clarifications may help, as some points you raise don’t reflect either the law or the reality of what happened at BHCC.
1. “lawful and precedented.”
You reference “Mawbey 2019” or “Pratchett 2021,” but there are no cases directly supporting the council cutting a resident’s deputation for viewpoint reasons. Across UK authorities, councils may suggest edits, but removing content simply because it “might polarise” is not recognised constitutional practice.
2. [The Mayor] “is entitled to order a resident to read only the edited version.”
Mrs Sheftz read the exact wording of her original deputation, despite the council cutting it drastically — by around half — in advance. The Mayor and officers are free to advise and make suggestions, but they had no lawful power to impose cuts or enforce acceptance of what amounts to a censored version. No section of the BHCC constitution permits removal of a part or parts of a deputation by officers or the Mayor, and in practice this has only been attempted in cooperation with residents when language is inadvertently defamatory or vexatious. This makes the mishandling of October 13th by the council completely unprecedented.
3. Complaints procedures
Contrary to what you say, BHCC’s procedure explicitly covers maladministration, procedural unfairness, and the conduct of officers in exercising their functions. Constitutional breaches are not automatically exempt. The council cites emails to Mrs Sheftz before and after the full council meeting and cites a later meeting with SJRC as adequate “explanation” (and therefore a formal complaint is not necessary). Yet Mrs Sheftz and the Jewish residents supporting the Deputation were not invited to the SJRC meeting, and by all accounts, the emails failed to address the wider procedural and ethical issues. Using these as the basis to refuse a complaint is spurious.
In short: the Council invented new powers on the fly, drastically cut the Jewish Residents Deputation against the presenter’s wishes, and then declined to investigate its own conduct. That is why the matter is serious and why residents are turning to the Ombudsman.
Well said Adrian. I attended the meeting in October with little foreknowledge of events leading up to the deputation. Mrs Sheftz must have felt like she had been thrown into a bear pit when she was reading her deputation. Many councillors joined in trying to censor her. Appalling behaviour.
I’m sorry Adrian, but it is objectively incorrect to state there are no cases support cutting a deputation for viewpoint reasons. The phrase “might polarise” is exactly the community cohesion test. It is not new, unlawful, or invented. Academic references explain the governance context and demonstrate the accepted practice.
It is completely incorrect to say that the mayor had no lawful power to enforce the edited text. The mayor absolutely has lawful authority to stop a deputation that does not follow the agreed text. That is basic chairing practice. It’s constitutional.
It is incorrect to say removing parts of a deputation is unprecedented and only done to avoid defamation. Constitutions, including BHCC’s, routinely allow officers to require revisions for cohesion; safety; incitement concerns; inflammatory content; and factual accuracy where falsehood could cause disorder.
BHCC’s complaints procedure excludes complaints about council policy, constitutional decisions, decisions of councillors in meetings and lawful governance actions – including MO advice. These are handled by Member Services, Monitoring Officer, or Standards – not the complaints team. The complaints team is not empowered to investigate constitutional decisions.
The powers exist, are used in other authorities, and are exactly what the Monitoring Officer is there for. The LGSCO is almost certainly not going to be interested in this, as there’s no administrative fault here.
I get the impression you misunderstand the framework, so you think something unprecedented happened, when this is objectively not the case. We can criticise the handling without overstating what the law actually allows or forbids.