Fiona Gordon - one to watch as Labour languishes

Among the people sitting in at Labour Party National Executive Committee meetings are usually the Prime Minister's Political Secretary Fiona Gordon and her deputy, Jonathan Ashworth. There is one today. I read in Tribune and have been 'tipped off' by well-placed sources that Fiona is the real General Secretary of the Labour Party. I have never met Fiona and can't find a photograph of her.

Given the depressing drift back to Blairite policies lamented at the Progress/Compass event last night chronicled here, I am wondering what her role is as the Party languishes in the polls ahead of an absolutely critical Mayoral election in London in May. Can anyone cast any light?

Comments

[Robert]

I think Blears and the New Labour crowd are still hoping the Tories will stay with them, sadly they better because I'll be dammed before I vote for a Tory government even if it's pretending to be Labour.

[Peter Kenyon]

Memo to self: This posting prompted a lively string of contributions over on Labourhome

http://www.labourhome.org/story/2008/3/20/52340/8986

Hat tips to Matt Stiles and rwendland for highlighting the salient features of this unsettling saga.

The Law Lords' ruling in the case of Watt (formerly Carter) and others v Ahsan published at the end of November last year brought a 10-year legal battle between the Labour Party and a former Birmingham City Council Labour councillor to an end.

http://www.24dash.com/news/Local_Government/2007-11-21-Former-councillor-wins-10-year-race-discrimination-battle

Buried at the bottom of that story is a quote from a Labour Party spokesperson saying:

"We have already amended procedures for the selection of candidates in Birmingham to make them even more transparent and will look in detail at this judgment to determine further action to be taken."

Might that extend to the role of the then Labour Party West Midlands Regional Secretary now employed as the Prime Minister's Political Secretary?

[rwendland]

Peter, have you spotted my latest addition on the labourhome thread - the deleted gossip has caused "-3 new" so you may not have noticed. I'd have thought this would be to your interest:

Another interesting/astonishing claim made by the Labour Party QC at the Court of Appeal is that it was perfectly reasonable for the Labour Party not to reselect a sitting councillor "because he was not New Labour." So we seem to have a pretty official statement that Labour Party canditates should be "New Labour", or else it is perfectly proper to deselect them.

I know the Labour Party and QC must have been clutching at straws to avoid the "racial discrimination" outcome, but this is pretty terrible in itself.

It also seems that in essence Sparkhill Ward branch was suspended because Councillor Ahsan was too successful in recruiting new party members, in part by his actions in helping people in his ward make successful housing grant claims! Had he been white, and recruiting new white members, would this have been a sin (even if the local paper wrote snotty articles about it)? It all stinks, and I'm amazed that it seems not to have impacted on the careers of the officials involved.