Lee Anderson has led the condemnation of Labour’s shadow Culture Secretary Thangam Debbonaire after she declared that “white privilege” should be taught in schools.
The comments were reported just hours after Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer had hit out at the “vacuous” culture wars and declared them to be a Tory distraction tactic.
Mr Anderson told Express.co.uk said Labour were being “hypocritical”.
He said: “I’m fed up with out-of-touch Labour MPs stoking up culture wars within our schools. Children need to be taught how to read and write, not to hate themselves due to the colour of their skin.”
Ms Debbonaire, a privately educated former professional cellist, told the BBC: “We need education that allows children the opportunity to question, to ask difficult questions sometimes of our nation’s history.
“Are there things we regret? Are there even things that we’re sorry about? But also are there things we can learn so that we make a stronger, better country for the future?”
She said teaching “white privilege” in schools, a doctrine which claims people are guilty of historic abuses because of the colour of their skin, was “a good idea”.
Louie French, the Tory MP for Old Bexley and Sidcup, said: “I am proud to be from a working-class background, but the idea that children from backgrounds similar to mine should be brainwashed into thinking they have a privileged life just because of their skin colour is both divisive and dangerous for our society.
“All children should instead be taught about the British values of fairness, hard work and opportunity and be given the skills to achieve a successful career and future regardless of their background.
“This latest own goal by the Labour Party is a timely reminder of how out of touch these champagne socialists are with working people.”
Stoke North MP Jonathan Gullis said: “Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour Party is the same one still that Corbyn was in charge of. Labour is the ‘culture war’ party, obsessed with undermining our history and our national identity, whilst taking a knee to whatever online craze is trending on X.”
Bassetlaw MP Brendan Clarke-Smith added: “Yesterday Sir Keir complained about ‘culture wars’. Then today we have this. If they stopped coming out with these daft ideas, especially in our schools, then we wouldn’t have to comment on them.”
Sir Keir had used his keynote speech yesterday to launch an attack on the right for “obsessing” about the culture wars.
Sir Keir said the Government had “got themselves so tangled up in culture wars of their own making” that it had “helped demonise” the RNLI rather than work with it to solve the Channel migrants crisis.
The Opposition leader said the Tories were engaging in a “kind of weird McCarthyism” – a reference to political repression in the fight against Communism in the US during the mid-20th century – with their response to civic institutions.
He continued: “Instead of working with the National Trust so more people can learn about – and celebrate – our culture and our history, they’ve managed to demean their work.
“In its desperation to cling on to power at all costs, the Tory Party is undertaking a kind of weird McCarthyism, trying to find woke agendas in the very civic institutions they once regarded with respect.
