Alex Sobel
| Alex Sobel link (Politician) | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Alexander David Sobel 26 April 1975 |
| Religion | Jewish |
| Party | Labour Co-op |
UK poliican | |
Alex Sobel is a British Labour and Co-operative politician who was elected Member of Parliament (MP) for Leeds North West at the UK/2017 General Election, and is a supporter of the Extinction Rebellion activist group.[1]
Net Zero
In July 2019 Alex Sobel teamed up with Richard Clarke MP (Con, Middlesbrough) to form a new, all-party Parliamentary group called Net Zero, which intends to work across Parliament, Government and the nation at large to ensure the UK reaches net zero carbon emissions at the earliest possible date.[2]
Businesses: the enemy
In an episode of the Climactic podcast, about the climate emergency, Alex Sobel told the presenter, Simon Moore, that when he came into parliament, he regarded businesses as the enemy and refused to meet them.
But he went on to say that solving the climate crisis would be impossible without the cooperation of corporations:
- “When I first came in as an MP I was like, I’m not taking meetings with any of these people, these people are the enemy, you know. I’m a socialist, my job is to effectively transform society so that we have a much more mixed economy and we don’t have huge global corporations which have all this power.
- “Now I take the meetings because I’m like, we haven’t got enough time, you know? That’s still my dream, but we aren’t going to have time to do that and save the climate. So we need to get them to make transformation now.”
Apology to Starmer
In March 2021, after the remarks were highlighted by the Sun newspaper, Sobel apologised to the Labour leader. Keir Starmer was asked about Sobel’s comments on a campaign visit to Hartlepool, where Labour faces a tough battle to retain the seat in May:
- “Alex Sobel knows what he said was wrong. He has apologised. He’s apologised to me. The Labour party, under my leadership, is very clearly pro-business. We want a partnership with business. And Alex Sobel understands that.”
Labour sources stressed that Sobel had not been forced to apologise but had voluntarily said sorry for the embarrassment caused. But the incident underlines Starmer’s determination to mark the fact that Labour is taking a more positive approach to business than did Jeremy Corbyn.[3]
References
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