CLPD & #lab22

CLPD & #lab22

Labour Hub have publicised the Left Slates for Labour’s internal elections, together with their recommended rule changes, available as word or .pdf. They include mine, the complete list is as follows, although some of the titles need to be changed as I think there is a 10 word limit. The deadline for CLPs to submit a rule change to Annual Labour Conference is 12 noon Friday 17th June.

  1. The Labour Party should be able to decide which Labour MPs can seek re-selection – not the PLP
  2. Calls for card votes from Annual Conference; delegates should not ignored
  3. Members need a Party Ombudsperson
  4. Ban lobbyists and property developers from being selected as local government or Parliamentary candidates
  5. Selection of Westminster parliamentary candidates – longlisting should to return to CLPs
  6. CLPs and affiliates should be allowed to submit a motion and a constitutional amendment to Party Conference
  7. CLPs and affiliates should be allowed to submit motions on organisational issues to Party Conference
  8. Popular rule change proposals should not have to wait three years to be discussed at Conference
  9. Full involvement by party branches and branches of affiliated organisations in the selection of Westminster candidates
  10. The NEC must decide on the powers to be granted to the General Secretary, and Conference take the final decision
  11. Member’s Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights
  12. Labour members should be required to be members of a trade union
  13. Member’s rights to free speech should be restored
  14. The NEC should stop publishing its proposed rule changes at the last minute – members need time to consider such proposals
  15. NEC final decisions and good faith
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How to make Labour’s policy and manifesto

How to make Labour’s policy and manifesto

Consultation is currently taking place as part of Labour's review of the way it makes policy.

Below are set out suggested responses to the questions the party is asking in the consultation. They are also attached as a word document here and a PDF file here.

Responses can be made up till 3 February, either on Labour's website here or emailed to here.

These will be more powerful if you could get a party unit to approve a submission, but there is not much time left.

The Labour Party web site offers the ability to upload the document, if you do this do not forget to add the name of your organisation to this document and to the relevant fields on the website. Otherwise, you can paste each response into the relevant question and amend it if you see fit.

The text of the submission is below/overleaf ...

Card Votes on Demand

The LP platform stitched up Conference over Brexit by refusing a card vote. I think this power needs to be taken away, and so have drafted this rule amendment. It is interesting that the old rule no longer exists and has been transferred to Conference Standing Orders.

C3.III.G

Insert before These standing orders will be presented ……

The Conference Standing orders are to state that voting will be by show of hands except a card vote will be undertaken as decided by the CAC who shall in their report to conference determine which votes must be resolved by a card vote. Card votes may additionally be invoked by the Chair of Conference and shall be so invoked if called for by 30 delegates.

ooOOOoo

One thing to be noted is that Conference still has the last word on the contents of the Programme (C1.V.2). For inclusion, the Programme, it needs to be approved by Conference by a ⅔ majority. Policy cannot be included in the manifesto without this approval, so the Brexit position, free train fares and free broadband would seem to be promises we should not have made. I am equally unclear where the Faith and Culture manifestos came from. (I don’t even know if they were approved by the Clause V meeting.) Policy votes where not overwhelming should be counted by a  card vote to ensure that it is accurately recorded as meeting the necessary thresholds be it ½ or ⅔ majority. …

Democracy for the many

The CLPD has considered for several years the vulnerability to the Left should there be another Leadership election in which the incumbent, Jeremy Corbyn was not able to stand.

The Democracy Review proposed changing the nomination threshold for Leader/Deputy Leader by  reducing the number of PLP/EPLP nominations and introducing effective nominations for affiliates and CLPs. The NEC in its pre-conference meetings rejected the Democracy Review proposal and reduced the PLP threshold to 10% while introducing  additional effective nominations from CLPs and affiliates. Many on the Left think the 10% threshold is too high for a true believer to be on the ballot paper.

Given that the Rule on Leadership nominations, Chapter 4, Clause II.2.B.i.  was changed at Conference 2018, Rule changes to this rule proposed by CLPs and affiliates may not be debated at the next three conferences. R3.III.1.H.

Some people in the CLPD came up with a cunning plan, since the number of motions was to be increased, the Left should use one of its motions to mandate the NEC to bring a rule change to the leadership nomination threshold to Conference 2020. See here.

Max Shanley, partly motivated by the anger felt at Tom Watson has proposed another motion in a similar vein. It is printed in full at the Skwawkbox.

The difference between the two motions are that Shanley’s motion removes the MPs from the nomination process altogether and brings forward the mandate to produce a rule change to this year from the CLPD’s 2020 time-line.

Both these will probably mean that the Unions will vote against it or stitch it up; the work to win the Unions to this has not been done. This was shown last year where the Unions via their reps on the NEC and their votes on Conference floor voted against open selection, against repeal of the three-year rule, and for the current Leadership nomination threshold. i.e. it was the Union votes on the NEC that voted to keep the MPs at 10% of the nomination qualification.

If these two motions are submitted to Conference and if they get through the Union dominated CAC, they may be grouped as a single topic and then subject to a composite meeting. Getting it through the CAC will not be simple as the NEC (or the Office) have been working mightily to keep organisational motions off the Women’s Conference agenda.

I suppose my fear is that the proposal to eliminate MPs from the nomination process will attract the notice and opposition of the Unions who will use their majority on the CAC to bury both.

I would think very carefully before supporting Shanley’s proposal.

Whatever you do on this issue though, you should seek mandates to support the abolition of the 3 year rule which to my knowledge will be on the order paper; you should seek to mandate your Union delegations as well as this will require Union votes to win. …

On Investigatory Powers, yet again

Time for another go on getting some decent policy against the surveillance state and against privatised investigatory powers. Here’s my first draft.

Investigatory Powers to be subject to Human Rights Law

Conference notes that the Investigatory Powers Act 2016 legalised the UK intelligence services to collect telecommunication usage data on all UK residents, now ruled as contrary to human rights law.

Conference notes the Immigration Act 2014 and Counter-Terrorism and Security Act 2015 requires numerous private & public sector organisations to collect personal data about their customers, users or charges.

Conference notes that all immigration enforcement data has been exempted from the Data Protection Act 2018.

Conference notes that the Counter-Terrorism and Security Act 2015 places surveillance duties on specified authorities including educational & healthcare institutions.

Conference notes the complete absence from the NPF report 2018 on the surveillance society and the illegal investigatory powers regime introduced by the Tories in 2016.

Conference believes that freedom of expression & thought and the right to privacy are universal human rights and the current surveillance and investigatory powers regime is in breach of these rights.

Conference resolves that a Labour Government will ensure that private and public surveillance technologies and systems will conform to laws that meet the requirements of the European Convention on Human Rights, including a need to prove reasonable suspicion before collecting evidence.

Conference calls on the Labour Party to draw up a Human Rights based policy for the regulation of British Law Enforcement authorities and their investigatory powers. This to include the abolition of Prevent, the repeal of the 2014 Immigration Act and the placing of UK Borders under the auspices of the Data Protection Act.

I’d like to work something about “getitrightfromagenuinesite” in, since that’s allegedly voluntary and yet still surveillance and I should try and work something in on black listing and the public and private sector surveillance of Trade Unions, but the above …

Labour on Brexit ’18

And so onto the Brexit debate. Both sides wanted to ensure that there was a single motion, and the composite meeting had agreed a single set of words. This topic was supported by more organisations than any topic ever, with over 100 supporting the positions of either the People’s Vote or Another Europe is Possible. CLPD had circulated a set of words, which reinforced Labour’s commitment to the six tests, and were supported by considerably less organisations. To some extent we remainers have won the debate in the Labour Party; there were no motions to leave no matter what and the six tests mean both the customs union and single market are to be part of Labour’s deal. For more, see below overleaf …  …

What CLPD wants debated at Conference

There are 14 CLPD model motions. The topic matter covers Macro Economics (inc. Brexit), Climate Change, Social Policy, Immigration & teh Surveillance State and Foreign Affairs and Defence. I have made a bit.ly link to the CLPD’s version of the full text, http://bit.ly/clpdmm2018 and I have made summaries of them and added a few personal comments below/overleaf. From these comments I have made a little video.

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