This Once Great Movement Of Ours

[CumbrianLefty]

Owen Jones did recently quote a Labour MP "close to Starmer" who said some in the party apparatus were set on a mass, and permanent, expulsion of the entire left from the party. 

[MaxQue]

Who says that mine is a charitable view? Nothing remotely charitable about it. But we know that things like this have been happening (or claimed to have) for decades, despite* the constant very high turnover of staff in HQ (which, ftr, is underfunded and understaffed even at the best of times, and these are not those), and we know that basic inability to deal with volume is a problem from a recent detailed report that touched on the administrative shortcomings of the organisation.

_{*Or in part because?}

If UK Labour is anything like Canada's NDP, the staffers think they know better than both the members and the MPs, and try to grab as much power as possible. Party staffing should always be kept to the minimum possible.

[Conservatopia]

Owen Jones did recently quote a Labour MP "close to Starmer" who said some in the party apparatus were set on a mass, and permanent, expulsion of the entire left from the party. 

Well if Owen Jones said it then it must be true.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Owen Jones did recently quote a Labour MP "close to Starmer" who said some in the party apparatus were set on a mass, and permanent, expulsion of the entire left from the party.

Jones is presently tying himself up in knots trying to argue that it is right and proper to place certain antisemitic organisations on the proscribed list but an outrage to automatically expel Ken Loach due to his role in one of those organisations that he says he supports the proscription of, so, hmm.

Of course it wouldn't surprise me if some people on the Right of the party do have fantasies about expelling the entire Left (up to an including Ed Miliband probably), but it would be no different to the existence of some people on the Left on the party who had fantasies about driving out everyone they considered to be on the 'Right' (i.e. everyone in the usual party mainstream) during the 2015-20 period. The fact is that there has never been a mass expulsion of the Left in the Labour Party's history, and actually orchestrating one would be extremely difficult even if there was the political will for it (and there certainly is not). A spate of strangely worded and/or mistaken investigations rowed back on immediately is potentially evidence of a lot of things, but not of a looming purge.

[Blair]

Dan Jarvis not standing for re-election as mayor.

I expected this; iirc he has no real power (and didn’t even get paid for a while) and it’s very difficult to do both jobs well- especially as he now has a marginal seat and being in Local Govt only really tends to sour voters.

He can also expect a return to the frontbench- he is a much better parliamentarian than his now low stock suggests*.


* he is the prime example of the Westminster bubble being able to ruin peoples careers. When he arrived in parliament he actively avoided getting involved in Armed Forces/veteran affairs out of fears of being typecast however from 2014 onwards he was typecast as labours ‘lost leader’ with various people of all stripes inserting the own image of what he could be. He then proceeded to write a widely panned New Statesman essay (sound familiar?) and got into a fight about whether he could be both an MP and mayor.

[CumbrianLefty]

Plus he just became another pretty generic anti-Corbyn MP when Jez took over. Others were louder and more strident in that regard, thus grabbing much of the media attention.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

https://twitter.com/siennamarla/status/1439973605518057473

The details noted above are:

'He said the issuing of a Notice of Investigation (NOI) to the Chair of Young Labour had been due to an error, and a full review had revealed it was because of processes not being followed properly. There was a backlog of 5,200 outstanding complaints being worked through. The Executive Director of Legal Affairs, Alex Barros-Curtis, said that the process of going through the backlog would take 6 months and was in its 7th week. External additional staff had been trained in Labour’s rules and processes to do this. 3,000 cases had been assessed so far, of which 30% had been closed at assessment stage as they did not merit investigation. The NOI to Jess Barnard had not been signed off properly but it was an innocent mistake by the person concerned. The tone of letters had been amended and staff reminded never to send them outside office hours.'

LMAO THIGMOO

[afleitch]

At this rate they'll get to Rosie Duffield when the sun expands.

[Blair]

Don’t the union GS’s have more power in the current system? Old system gives powers to these TU members who choose to vote and pay the political levy- these voters broadly aren’t that different to Labour members!

It was mistake to get rid of the college as they did but I equally feel any new system will be even worse- the 2010 race showed how easy it is for it to be become another toxic part of the forever wars and if the mainstream want to rig it just change the ballot requirements.

https://mobile.twitter.com/siennamarla/status/1440004655682043918

https://mobile.twitter.com/AaronBastani/status/1439981887251009537

[Blair]

Mainstream being different to the Labour progress right- who barely have 30 MPs and thus want to keep it low.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The general emphasis of most of the rules changes that have already happened or which are mooted and/or rumoured to be under consideration is, yes, very much in the direction of making pretty sure that the Party Mainstream cannot lose control to groups on either outer flank of the party. STV for the CLP section of NEC elections remains one of the more cunning tricks seen so far.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Don’t the union GS’s have more power in the current system? Old system gives powers to these TU members who choose to vote and pay the political levy- these voters broadly aren’t that different to Labour members!

Depends on what sort of influence you want. The present set-up gives them a blocking influence: without TU endorsements candidates have to go round the country securing CLP endorsements and that's a lot of work. The old system gave them a more active influence. If the idea is to keep to the one vote per member rule then they would have more influence over an Affiliates Section in an EC than before as back then you had as many votes as affiliated orgs you were a member of (plus Party Membership if you had that).

[Blair]

I was going to joke about people not learning the rules and then realised I’d forgotten the unions can be side stepped through the CLPs- I think it was Thornberry who ended up talking to some hilariously small ones in 2020.

I’d be surprised if it passed but the reaction suggests they might have the votes. Although the tested method will be the TU to either fudge or kick it down the road.

Don’t the union GS’s have more power in the current system? Old system gives powers to these TU members who choose to vote and pay the political levy- these voters broadly aren’t that different to Labour members!

Depends on what sort of influence you want. The present set-up gives them a blocking influence: without TU endorsements candidates have to go round the country securing CLP endorsements and that's a lot of work. The old system gave them a more active influence. If the idea is to keep to the one vote per member rule then they would have more influence over an Affiliates Section in an EC than before as back then you had as many votes as affiliated orgs you were a member of (plus Party Membership if you had that).

Am I being dense in thinking that as both a Labour member and say affiliate member (as I am) you’d get to either pick which one you use (one would be worth more) or even vote twice?

[Blair]

I actually hate party conferences. Every one since I joined in 2014 have been an absolute disaster in one way or another with virtually every faction debasing themselves in public.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I’d be surprised if it passed but the reaction suggests they might have the votes. Although the tested method will be the TU to either fudge or kick it down the road.

It depends on whose idea it is and where the energy for it is coming from. If the answer is 'a number of General Secretaries', then it will presumably pass. If it's other people trying their luck, well, hmm. But we shall see.

Am I being dense in thinking that as both a Labour member and say affiliate member (as I am) you’d get to either pick which one you use (one would be worth more) or even vote twice?

If they kept the rule in place about only having one vote, you would get a choice whether to vote as a Party Member or as an Affiliate Member, I think. But just the one vote.

[Blair]

It obviously hasn’t happened but the reaction seems rather muted- and the reaction from certain people suggests they think it’s lost.

Maybe because it’s an internal party reform (something many members don’t even care about!) and a hypothetical- or because this is the 25th thing the left have been outraged about.

It is funny that people seem to think that Labour is a Democratic member led Party based on one member one vote (the defeat of OMOV was one reason the SDP was formed- they supported it) Equally anyone who has seen how council shortlisting works, how trigger ballots run or how any internal cog of the party barely spins knows we love a long confusing process. Anyway it’s a sign that people think Labour didn’t exist before the Collins review.

If it does happen it will change the dynamics and ego’s of many in the PLP- I expect a number of people who never expected to win the membership will now want to go for it. I assume they’ll increase the nominations needed to challenge otherwise a few MPs will start making calls.

[Blair]

I look forward to results like this returning…. to this day I remain baffled at this result.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Labour_Party_deputy_leadership_election

[EastAnglianLefty]

I actually hate party conferences. Every one since I joined in 2014 have been an absolute disaster in one way or another with virtually every faction debasing themselves in public.

In an ideal world, conference would just be for fringe meetings and frontbenchers' speeches, because the parts that are meant to be about democratic control of the party are a legacy of the 1920s. Any claim that it's about democracy doesn't survive an encounter with how delegates get selected (ie who can afford to take a week off work) let alone the compositing process.

We do not live in an ideal world, so we're going to have to keep pretending it's at all functional for decades to come.

[Blair]

Yeah there’s actually a very valid argument for having two conferences- one that deals with internal party reforms (there is always a backlog and panic with reforms getting pushed through- imagine an organisation that can only change its structure every 12 months!) and one that is a much more relaxed set of fringes.

This happens in reality anyway - I spent 2019 conference in fringes and chatting with people, while delegates I knew were locked in a room for 14 hours talking about Brexit.

[CumbrianLefty]

The takes on these proposed changes are genuinely hilarious given who supported - and opposed - the current way of doing things back in 2013.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The takes on these proposed changes are genuinely hilarious given who supported - and opposed - the current way of doing things back in 2013.

Classic THIGMOO really: eventually every single potential position on any internal matter ends up being occupied for a time by every single faction and sub-faction. All of whom, at the time, insist that their stance is a matter of Deepest Principle.

My own view is (perhaps predictably) that the present system - which is essentially a very odd and convoluted three-round affair - is a bit of a camel and can't be defended on its own terms, but that neither version of the EC worked well in practice.

[EastAnglianLefty]

The system usually only matters when it's close between the leading candidates or when the eventual winner is unacceptable to a critical mass of one section of the party. Where that's the case, the outcome is likely to be bad whatever system you use, so it's basically just an exercise in picking which kind of debacle you want.

[Blair]

I thought this was already the case? Edit: oh wait I’m wrong.

https://mobile.twitter.com/jessicaelgot/status/1440347517942566913

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Yes the present rule is that you have to sign up specifically as an 'Affiliate Member' at the launch of the contest. This applies to the Socialist Societies as well as the affiliated TUs.

[Blair]

It’s funny I’ve been looking again at the Collins Review and the reason why the college was abolished- it’s interesting how much Ed Miliband sought to make it an example of how Labour had changed and was more ‘in touch’ with Britain.

Is it also a simplification to say it only happened because of Falkirk?
 
My other thought overnight is that it’s hard to see this reform surviving; although the obvious caveat is that if it’s introduced the next leader would have won through it.