The two leading factions have announced their recommendations for how CLP delegates should vote in the #lab23 conference priorities ballot. Only 12 motion topics are debated, six of which are the result of a ballot of the CLP delegates. The rest of this article looks at the factions' recommendations and laments the likelihood that important contrarian views will not be debated. To read the article in full, use the 2Read More" button ...
An article previewing #lab23. I am concerned about the macro economics, policy on trade and the EU and on electoral strategy. For the full article, use the read more button. ...
As a member of the AEIP National Committee, I have been campaigning to reverse Brexit. The personal politics that led me to stand for their NC is based on both an abstract commitment to what the EU could be and a detailed observation of the economic and social advantages of common citizenship, together with the economic advantages to the nation of belong to the European Union. The absence of the EU’s freedom of movement to work and the common citizenship rights do not affect the rich. Overleaf, the full article looks at the arguments to rejoin the single market, and charts the last act of Lewisham Deptford CLP in sending a motion to #lab23 calling to rejoin the single market. It also documents the speech I made.
To see the full article overleaf, use the "Read More" button. ...
I comment on Starmer's shadow cabinet reshuffle, looking at the macro-politics and also the impact on Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. I have studied two of these topics in some detail and hope my insights are useful. For more, use the "Read More" button ...
But that was in 1963, sixty years ago. Due to some personal reappraisals of my politics, I have been looking at the writing of Ralph Miliband and was pointed at an article he wrote in the run up to the 1964 election, called “If Labour wins”, republished in the New Left Review. I found it worth reading to observe the parallels between then and now. Wilson’s Labour were leading in the polls, the Tories had suffered the setbacks of Suez, and the Profumo affair and replaced a popular and powerful leader with a patrician land owner who was not even an MP arguable a stalemate choice between the then two leading Tory candidates.
This article contains a number of quotes from the article, as they speak for themselves, although of course I can’t help but comment. I have collected the quotes and comments into pieces on culture and comedy, economics, foreign affairs, corruption, campaigning and hope and the Labour left. … …
Mish Raman reports on the July NEC. He talks abiut membership, the Forde Report, the NPF, Conference, and the HQ premises.
On membership, he reports that the membership figure is 385,000 (net of those in arrears) which is 3,000 up on this time last year, but 10,000 down on the quarter. We are still waiting for the end 2022 numbers; my last review, [or on Medium] quotes from an NEC report at end June 2022 as ~382,000 although I may not be treating arrears in the same way.
They are winding up the Forde Report working group, failed to present the report to the NEC and plan to issue some codes of conduct for both members and senior officers of the organisation. I mean to write a review of what they’ve done, and what they have not, and what they plan to ignore; but the papers are on my personal server as well the Labour Party’s site’s Forde Report pge.
Martin Forde, the author of the report, would seem to be unhappy as the Guardian and others summarise the report, that Party is operating a “hierarchy of racism” and the the process remains insufficiently transparent, certain and free from factionalism. At a meeting hosted by Compass he is reported, again in the Guardian as,
The top lawyer echoed his previous comments that the Labour party must take seriously concerns of black and asian members that their complaints are not being treated as seriously as those related to antisemitism. “It’s not enough to say, ‘I’ve been on a course’, and that means I’m untouchable.”
Mish reports on the proceedings of the National Policy Forum, saying that, “The final NPF document will be available after conference.” Which is worrying as its report has usually been published in order that CLPs can seek to amend the report at Conference; from Mish’s words this may not bet the case.
The Conference exhibition will be the biggest ever it seems. Business returns to a party of government. The conference floor will surely be smaller, as the membership has declined and they now have a cap on the number of delegates.
It seems the HQ is now in Blackfriars but is going to move again, and the next NEC may meet in Scotland.
Check out this thread at Thread Reader App page, or at the first tweet on twitter. …
I was published, last week, at Another Europe’s Brexit Watch site with the subtitle, “Labour is lurching to the right on immigration”. What follows below/overleaf mirrors that article, with the deadlines for the National Policy Forum interventions removed, because by the time I made this mirror, the deadlines had passed. The article looks at the Labour front bench’s reticence to speak up for migrants and the refusal to rejoin the EU’s single market, a topic on which Starmer has long term form;it also looks at the tendency to prioritise public finance and competence, over compassion and decency, studies the electoral impact of the position, and suggests what a decent immigration policy would look like. It was originally designed to encourage Labour members to canvass their NPF representatives. See below/over leaf for more, or go to the Another Europe version of the article. … …
Here is a swift call to action on Labour’s National Policy Forum, on relations with the European Union. I made an extract of the document to collect what they say. Earlier this month, Labour issued its NPF report in draft form. Members have the ability, through their local parties, to amend the this report; Labour Party members have until May 29th to notify, through their CLPs, their CLP NPF Reps of changes they want to see in the draft policy document.
Perhaps the critical paragraph is,
An improved relationship with Europe
To deliver prosperity at home, it is vital to re-establish the UK as a trusted and reliable partner. As part of our mission for the UK to achieve the highest sustained economic growth in the G7, Labour will seek to improve the UK’s trade and investment relationship with Europe while maintaining its new role outside of the single market and customs union.
Labour’s NATIONAL policy FORUM dRAFT rEPORT 2023
I believe that the UK should rejoin the European Union but that a first step is that, it is necessary to rejoin the customs union and single market to alleviate and reverse the decline in economic activity and prosperity; it is now obvious to the vast majority of the UK population that this is the direction required. I also believe a failure to get the position on the EU right will jeopardise Labour’s electoral prospects.
Labour must,
1. call for a new relationship with the EU involving the adoption of the single market and customs union, including a reciprocal freedom of movement to work and that as part of this, Labour must repeal the cruel hostile environment.
2. commit to rejoin Horizon Europe and Erasmus+
3. add to the draft the recent promise to permit EU citizen/residents to vote in UK Parliamentary elections
The Labour Movement for Europe are proposing that, the Party must promise to negotiate direct access to the single market and a selective visa waiver system. We believe we must commit to the single market’s free movement of labour with no sectoral reservations but wish the LME well. We think their position will be less acceptable to the EU since their position is that the four freedoms are indivisible. To me it’s an example of our continued attachment to “Extrawurst”!
The featured image is one of mine. CC DFL 2017 BY-SA …
Over the weekend, Labour produced what it seems we must now call a meme, associating Rishi Sunak with Tory policies of being ineffective and soft on crimes against children. This may have been in response to some disgusting things said by Braverman who wrongly sought to associate British Pakistani men with child grooming. The meme and the sub-text have repelled a number of anti-racism, pro-migrant activists and almost certainly some ethnic minority voters if you want to see more of the debate then it’s easy enough to find.
The rest of this article, overleaf, looks at Labour's response, at similar responses in the past, and finish by examining the complexity of the issues and the expertise available to move beyond abuse and slogans. ...
Will Hutton, the author of “The State we’re in” (1996), has written in the Observer, and article entitled “Ignore the detractors – Keir Starmer is a radical who can transform the country“.
I find this drastically over-optimistic; the demand expansion of £28bn over 5 years is not a lot and is less than we used to get from the EU’s Horizon. The Labour opposition, are flirting with QMT and have a dreadful view on policing, protest and a whole bunch of civil liberty issues, and that’s before we start on immigration. Even when they come close to innovative decency, such as on pre-crime, someone pulls them back. In terms of building a progressive government, it’s like Dave Allen’s journeys to Dublin, you don’t want to start from here! I look at the promises on constitutional reform, growth & energy, nationalisation and economic planning, demand management, workers’ rights and crime. … …