UK's first female Sikh MP gets threatening email, says "watch your back"

London: UK's first female Sikh MP gets threatening email, says "watch your back" received a direct threat via email saying "watch your back".

She was forced to increase security.

Speaking to GB News on Saturday, she said she is worried for her family's safety. "It was very direct. It is a worry because I'm with my daughters in the constituency all the time. My family lives there. It really puts into context the kind of job that you do. This latest direct threat has worried me. As a woman, when you put yourself forward and you want to address injustices and you care about issues that affect your constituents, you're then faced with people that think it's OK to say this sort of stuff to you. I could not believe that this person used their place of work email to make that threat."

"Normally most people would probably use an alias or try different ways of sort of creating a hate campaign. I've had huge amounts of hate campaigns created against me through WhatsApp groups too. It's something I discuss with my team. I worry not just about my safety but about theirs. I don't want to restrict my surgeries, I don't want to go to an appointment-based system, I want to be able to be open and be in my community and make sure that people feel that they can have that access to myself," she added.

She said her ethnicity has been a reason for isolation in terms of support. "Sometimes I think that is really quite tough as a woman facing so much kind of hate and criticism when you are trying to do something good."

The 50-year-old is the Opposition Labour MP for Birmingham, Edgbaston. She is also a frontbench politician as the shadow secretary of state for international development.