Wakefield Constituency Labour party’s selection of Simon Lightwood as the prospective parliamentary candidate in the upcoming by-election showed us another power grab by Starmer and the leadership. The resignation of the previous Tory MP, who has now been jailed should mean Labour are in a good position to regain a seat they had previously held for 87 years.
But their actions in excluding two popular local candidates from the long list, both Wakefield councillors, caused the entire Wakefield CLP executive to resign.
Their statement says:
“Over the past year the Wakefield Labour Party has repeatedly put two requests to party headquarters:
“1. To do an early selection to avoid a rushed job and get a candidate in place early
“2. We wanted a local candidate
“The rules say a shortlist should be drawn up by a five-person panel, three chosen by the local Labour Party, plus one each from the NEC and the Yorkshire Region. The NEC simply reversed this, with three from the NEC itself plus one for region and one local (which had to be female).
“The rules say there should be a week between publication of shortlist and the vote, so members can find out about the candidates and a chance to think about their choice. The NEC have given two clear days.
“We asked for local candidates, but there are none. Three prominent council and local Labour candidates, including the deputy council Leader, didn’t even make it onto the ‘longlist’.
“A shortlist of four was requested by our representative on the panel to give members some choice but the NEC members insisted on just two.
“Representations to party officials at the highest level have got absolutely nowhere, with some queries not even answered.”
Labour appears to have ignored Party rules to rush the selection and exclude at least one candidate on the left of the party. Labour and union activists should push for selections to be run according to the rules, and pressure National Executive reps from both CLPs and unions to ensure pro-leadership candidates are not just parachuted in at the expense of a fair contest.
