Following the news that he had been suspended from the Labour Party for posting a racist tweet about Priti Patel, Howard Beckett appeared on Sky News this morning to try and mend the damage. Guido’s not sure he came close to succeeding…

Pressed by Adam Boulton on why he posted the tweets, and whether he planned to withdraw his candidacy for Unite’s general secretary, Beckett said:

“I don’t have a racist bone in my body…I’ve made it perfectly clear that the intention of that tweet was to highlight institutionalised racism on the part of the Tory government… No, my voice will be heard, and I will not being doing anything other than putting my name forward for the candidature of the general secretary of Unite.”

Unite has now also released a statement condemning Beckett’s tweet, though stopping short of rescinding his general secretary nomination:

“Howard Beckett made some offensive, inappropriate comments on social media for which he has correctly and unreservedly apologised.

Unite will be offering no further comment, consistent with our policy of not commenting on staffing matters.”

Guido’s sure this laid-back approach from the left would be consistently applied had it been a Tory making such comments about a prominent brown woman…