Aha! Now Duncan Morrison says what he’s getting at in his stream of letters of complaint about Jon Lansman’s article in Solidarity 343. Or maybe he does.
Lansman’s article was “right wing” because it said that “the current Labour leadership shouldn’t be got rid of”. It was wrong because it “argue[d] that there shouldn’t be a leadership election”.
So long we could have got up a left candidate, we should have favoured a leadership contest being forced, even if by way of a right-wing surge among Labour MPs to make Miliband resign and was sure to install a more right-wing leader, Alan Johnson or whoever?
I think that is what Duncan is saying. If so, it’s wrong. To help along a right-wing surge just because in passing it gives us a chance to get some debates is wrong.
But then Duncan insists that in the British Labour Party, unlike the Scottish, left leadership candidates are impossible. If so, then what was wrong with Lansman’s stance? Lansman didn’t positively endorse Miliband.
There’s a case for reviving the old Campaign for Labour Party Democracy demand that Labour Party leaders should be elected annually. But that’s a different matter.