Peter Mandelson’s attitude to class politics is widely seen as typified by his comment that the New Labour government was “intensely relaxed about people getting filthy rich”. He, like rival political parties and hostile voices in the media, continually questions the role of trade unions and of their members within our party – in parliamentary selections, […]
Posts Tagged ‘Parliamentary Selections’
Mandelson’s got a nerve
May 14th, 2013 by Michael Meacher.It takes quite a lot of gall to be accusing the unions of trying to fix Labour parliamentary selections when you yourself have been engaged on doing exactly that for the last 20 years. When I first joined the PLP in the 1970s, it was composed very broadly of 40% on the Left and 40% […]
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Progress, class and parliamentary selections
Apr 25th, 2013 by Ken Livingstone.I am one of those who wants to see more working class people – and a bigger range of people generally – active in the highest levels of politics. So I welcome the emphasis the party is placing on broadening the social composition of parliament. That process is certainly not going to be resolved across the […]
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Progress: the fixers attack the “fixing”
Apr 22nd, 2013 by Jon Lansman.Once again the Blairites are attacking Ed Miliband and Labour’s new direction. No sooner had David Miliband announced his departure from British politics than Blair, Mandelson, Milburn and other assorted “grandees” started to attack his brother, without regard to the impending local elections. Cowardly right-wing shadow cabinet members are briefing anonymously against him on a daily basis too. […]
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On Progress and the parliamentary candidate selection process
Mar 11th, 2013 by Paul Cotterill.Richard Angell, Deputy Head of Progress party-within-the-party, has written an interesting column on how Labour parliamentary candidates are selected and new rules to increase working-class representation. This might sound dull as ditchwater, but the process is actually a pretty key variable when it comes to what kind of person we end up getting to represent us in […]
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Labour candidate selection: UPDATE
Jan 24th, 2013 by Jon Lansman.Yesterday we reported on changes to Labour’s parliamentary candidate selection procedures. We did so on having spoken to members of the executive about the meeting and the content of the papers they had received. Unfortunately, we got it wrong in some respects — and fortunately the changes turn out to be better than we’d understood […]
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Labour executive tinkers with candidate selection but radical surgery needed
Jan 23rd, 2013 by Jon Lansman.(With Postscript on by-elections and late selections and please also see this update) Selecting a parliamentary candidate in a winnable seat is perhaps the greatest influence a party member has on the political process. And it might happen only once in 20 or 30 years. You would think Labour’s national executive would give it serious […]
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Shining a light into Labour’s shadow
Dec 13th, 2012 by Peter Willsman.Peter Willsman’s reading of Banana Republic UK? by Sam Buckley, published in 2011, prompted another look at the parliamentary selection scandal and subsequent cover up in Erith & Thamesmead in 2009. As well as covering covers vote rigging, fraud and error in British elections since 2001, this book has a section on “vote rigging in […]
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Rotherham: let’s hope the price of control freakery isn’t too high
Nov 15th, 2012 by Jon Lansman.In commenting further on the Rotheram by-election now just two weeks away, we are working hard on our self-restraint. The walk-out of the vast majority of party members from the selection meeting, the fact that the final tally in an OMOV ballot of all party members was 13 to 11, speaks for itself. The post-mortem […]
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Video: Rotherham deputy leader confronts party official at selection meeting
Nov 14th, 2012 by Newsdesk.This short video was linked from the website of the Rotherham Advertiser. It features a member of the constituency party – identified on Twitter as council deputy leader Jahangir Akhtar – confronting a party official on the exclusion of candidates from the NEC shortlist. This is presumably before the majority of members present at the […]
