Labour Party

Unions: pull Starmer into line!

Through Labour’s National Policy Forum in July and the Labour Party conference, 8-11 October in Liverpool, Solidarity will be pressing for activists to organise in unions and local Labour Parties to call Keir Starmer to account. The Labour leaders’ draft programme, the National Policy Forum report released on 11 May, sets up two barriers against making reality of its bland and blurred talk of social advance. It defines everything as having to be done in concert with or for the benefit of “business”. “We will make Britain the best place in the world to start and grow a business by making the...

Fight for liberty!

Early on 6 May, before the day’s coronation procession, police arrested Graham Smith and other organisers of the republican protest planned around the procession, and confiscated their placards. The cops cited, so the BBC reports, “suspicion of affray, public order offences, breach of the peace and conspiracy to cause a public nuisance”. On 8 May the police told the organisers they would take “no further action”; the organisers are now talking to lawyers about suing the police. Republic is a “moderate” organisation. It discussed its protest plans with the police in advance, and gained approval...

Tories lose votes in spite of Starmer's drift to the right

Discussing the 4 May local election results, pollster John Curtice told the BBC: “Perhaps there is a message here that voters are not yet fully enthused about the Labour alternative even if they are clearly disenchanted with the current Conservative government” The Tory vote was down to rhe equivalent of 26% in a general election, from 30% in last year’s local elections. The Tories lost 1,058 council seats, and that after losing over 1,330 when the same seats were contested in 2019. This despite their attempt at voter suppression through new voter ID laws . For the first time in almost three...

Why the Tories just surged in Leicester

Background: • Behind Labour's purge of Leicester councillors • Hindu nationalism, communalism and the left • How the Tories won huge swing in Leicester amidst Truss debacle Over most of the country the recent local elections saw big net gains for Labour, the Lib Dems and the Greens, and disastrous losses for the Tories. The picture in Leicester was very different, however. In 2019 Peter Soulsby, Labour’s candidate for City Mayor, won with just over 60% of the vote and Labour took 53 out of 54 seats on the council, with the sole remaining seat going to the Lib Dems. This time Peter Soulsby was...

Labour moves against affiliating to Republic

The Guardian ( 5 May ) has highlighted a message from Labour officials to local Labour Parties that they must not affiliate to a slew of campaigns, including mild and respectable ones like the anti-monarchist group Republic. The instructions derive from a 2021 rule change which said that no local Labour Party could affiliate to campaigns not already endorsed by Labour's National Executive Committee. Effectively, it rules out local Labour Parties being more left-wing (or more right-wing, for that matter) in their formal campaigning affiliations than the Labour Party leadership. The cited...

Labour party report

1. Many leftists have quit the LP since December 2019: many who remain have become less active; the unreconstructed-Blairite Streeting-Reeves axis is setting the pace in the LP leadership and feels confident to manipulate selections heavily; the left Labour MPs are usually timid and fearful; meeting routines in some CLPs have atrophied. 2. The ban on Workers’ Liberty has limited socialist activity in the Labour Party, and it has been uphill work getting vocal opposition to it (though so far the motion against the ban has been passed in every CLP which has debated it). We can and should...

Diane Abbott and racism

Left-wing MP Diane Abbott has apologised unreservedly for what she wrote about “Irish, Jewish and Traveller” people not suffering racism. Even ultra-Blairite John McTernan commented: “Swift and appropriate apology from Diane Abbott. She has been subjected to vile racist abuse throughout her career, and her apology should be accepted in the spirit it is offered”. The Labour leadership, which has largely declined to defend Abbott against racist and misogynist abuse, is opportunist and hypocritical on bigotry and oppression, and will show that again if it doesn’t lift her suspension from the...

Labour Right wins West Mids Mayor selection

The Labour Right has won big in the West Midlands mayoral selection race, with 60% of the vote going to Richard Parker, a former corporate accountant and partner at PwC.

Against ban on Corbyn, against "independent" contest

Since the 28 March decision by Labour’s National Executive (NEC) to formalise Keir Starmer’s ban on Jeremy Corbyn standing as Labour candidate in Islington North at the next election, Islington North Labour Party has protested and “Islington Friends of Jeremy Corbyn” has started a petition to back Corbyn. More important than a petition is what can be done in the unions. At the NEC GMB, Usdaw and MU voted for the ban, and Unison abstained; Unite, CWU, Aslef, TSSA, and FBU voted against (with the disability rep and five CLP reps). The ban motion recognised Corbyn as a Labour member in good...

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