I see Len McCluskey, as usual, has an insightful, and completely understated, take on events
(
Tweet, my bold)
And a quick look around Twitter shows that he's not the only one on the left using that language.
Last time I checked,
persecution meant things like, having all your family killed, or being 'disappeared' into a secret prison and repeatedly tortured, or having your home destroyed and being forced to flee, etc. I never knew that the sheer awfulness having to sit as an independent MP, keeping all your MP's privileges except for not having the the party whip, could cause such intense suffering as to amount to 'persecution'!