Ed Miliband calls for Russell Brand probe after seeking star's backing

Ed Miliband calls for investigation into the allegations against Russell Brand as Labour is questioned over seeking the comedian’s endorsement at the 2015 election

Labour is under pressure for seeking the endorsement of Russell Brand ahead of the 2015 election.

The party’s former leader Ed Miliband notably sat down with the controversial comedian to try and garner votes from the young.

Mr Miliband, now in Sir Keir Starmer’s shadow cabinet, finally broke his silence over the allegations made against Brand, 48, yesterday.

But he failed to address why he decided to cosy up with the celebrity and self-confessed sex addict. Meanwhile, the Labour Party has remained silent over the episode.

A spokesman for Mr Miliband said: ‘The allegations of rape and sexual assault made against Russell Brand are appalling. They must be fully investigated.

‘Ed stands with all victims of sexual violence, and in solidarity with the women who have come forward.’

Russell Brand had been touring his Bipolarisation show when allegations were first published by The Sunday Times and Channel 4’s Dispatches. The tour has now been suspended 

A spokesperson for Ed Miliband said the ex-Labour Party leader ‘stands with all victims of sexual violence, and in solidarity with the women who have come forward’

Brand has vehemently denied the ‘very, very serious criminal allegations’, insisting that all his sexual relationships have been consensual.

The accusations span from 2006 until 2013, though there is no suggestion the Labour frontbencher was aware of them when he appeared on his show.

Mr Miliband won the endorsement of Brand following the interview in April 2015 where he said Britain needed to ‘confront’ the ‘richest and most powerful’.

But it came weeks after the celebrity had told young people not to register to vote prompting widespread ridicule.

Months earlier, Mr Miliband claimed that Brand was ‘saying what a number of people are thinking’.

Speaking in Brand’s east London home in 2015, Mr Miliband said that Britain needed to ‘confront’ the ‘richest and most powerful’.

The comedian ended the interview saying: ‘We learned a lot about Labour and a lot about Ed Miliband. I found it a very interesting experience.

‘It says a lot about Ed Miliband, he understands the way the media works now, the way the country feels, that he was prepared to come round here and talk to us.’

While allegations of sexual abuse only came to light last weekend Brand has long been a controversial figure.

Labour has not commented on why the party chose to cosy up to Russell Brand ahead of the 2015 election, by which time his history of drug usage and sex addiction was well-known

Russell Brand has vehemently denied the allegations made against him by a number of women in reports by The Sunday Times and Channel 4’s Dispatches (pictured: Brand leaving the Troubadour Wembley Park theatre on Saturday after performing a stand-up show)

He jokingly told Jimmy Savile he would bring him his female assistant naked live on his BBC Radio Two show in 2007. It emerged five years later that Savile was a serial abuser.

Brand was eventually fired by the BBC in 2008 after he and Jonathan Ross left obscene messages on the answerphone of Fawlty Towers actor Andrew Sachs.

The celebrity joked about sleeping with Sachs’ granddaughter in a series of vile messages recorded live on air that horrified the nation.

Despite this Mr Miliband decided to appear on Brand’s YouTube show called The Trews which castigates so-called mainstream media.

Pat McFadden, a Labour shadow minister, was challenged over Mr Miliband’s previous association with Brand during an interview with GB News on Sunday.

Asked by host Camilla Tominey whether the shadow climate secretary should apologise for ‘cosying up’ to Brand ahead of the 2015 election, he did not address the question directly.

He replied: ‘These allegations have just emerged and they’re really serious. What I would say is they illustrate the need for the criminal justice system to take allegations of violence against women and girls really seriously.’

Labour has been approached for comment.

Russell Brand’s comments in full:  

Hello there you awakening wonders. Now this is not the usual type of video we make on this channel where we critique, attack and undermine the news in all its corruption because in this story I am the news.

I have received two extremely disturbing letters – or a letter and an email – one from a mainstream media TV company, one from a newspaper listing a litany of extremely egregious and aggressive attacks, as well as some pretty stupid stuff, like my community festival should be stopped and I shouldn’t be able to attack mainstream media narratives on this channel.

But amidst this litany of astonishing rather baroque attacks are some very serious allegations that I absolutely refute. These allegations pertain to a time when I was in the mainstream, when I was in the newspapers all the time, when I was in the movies, and as I’ve written about extensively in my books I was very, very promiscuous.

During that time of promiscuity the relationships I had were absolutely always consensual. I was always transparent about that then, almost too transparent, and I am being transparent about it now as well.

And to see that transparency metastasized into something criminal that I absolutely deny makes me question is there another agenda at play. 

Particularly when we have seen coordinated media attacks before, like Joe Rogan where he dared to take a medicine the mainstream media didn’t approve of and we saw a spate of headlines of media outlets around the world using the same language.

I am aware that you guys in the comments have been for a while saying ‘watch out Russell, they’re coming for you,’ ‘you are getting too close to the truth’, ‘Russell Brand did not kill himself’.’

I know a year ago there was a spate of articles: Russell Brand is a conspiracy theorists; Russell Brand is right wing.

I am aware of newspapers making phone calls, sending letters to people I know. For ages and ages, it’s been clear to me or at least feels to be there’s a serious and consorted agenda to control these kinds of spaces and these kind of voices.

I need my voice along with your voice. I don’t mind them using my books and my stand up to talk about my promiscuous sexual conduct in the past. What I seriously refute are these very, very serious, criminal allegations.

Also its worth mentioning that there are witnesses whose evidence directly contradicts the narratives that these two mainstream media outlets are trying to construct, apparently in what seems to be to me a coordinated attack.

Now, I don’t want to get into this any further because of the serious nature of the allegations but I feel like I’m being attacked and plainly they are working very closely together.

We are obviously going to look into this matter because it is very, very serious. 

In the meantime, I want you to stay close, stay awake but more importantly than any of that, if you can stay free. 

Source: Read Full Article