Peter Kenyon

Timeline to diktat: Labour Party candidate selection - Tower Hamlets

At the risk of further accusations of fuelling dissent in neighbouring Tower Hamlets, here's the timeline:

21 October 2010 - election of a sitting councillor as elected Mayor triggering a Council by-election in Spitalfields and Banglatown Ward

29 October 2010 - letter sent inviting applications from candidates wishing to stand to represent the Labour Party in the above ward

4 November 2010 - deadline for applications for Labour Party members to apply

6 November 2010 - 'Selection Panel' approved by/appointed by London Labour Party 'selects' candidate

UPDATE 11 November

11 November 2010 - Tower Hamlets Labour Party Executive Committee meets (London Regional Director Ken Clark has written to local chair Graham Taylor banning all party meetings until after the S&B by-election on 16 December)

19 November 2010 - deadline for nomination of candidates for the Spitalfields and Banglatown ward by-election

It is highly likely I have missed out some important steps in this process. But the questions that arise are:

1) who authorised the procedure adopted?

2) why were ward members excluded from the selection process at the outset?

3) is it humanly possible to amend for the errors and enable all members in Spitalfields and Banglatown Ward to decide for themselves who should be the Labour Party candidate in the by-election?

On the final point, I would just add that I am about to circulate a communication to all members in the City of London (Branch) Labour Party. I know all 80 plus members will have been sent the communique before the close of business today, with the exception of three who will (subject to the readiness of CWU members to deliver first class post next day) get the mailout tomorrow.

Why can't the members of neighbouring Spitalfields and Banglatown Branch Labour Party enjoy the same service?

UPDATE 2150 - Local paper reports Labour withdraws Spitalfields and Banglatown candidate after ‘outraged’ members complain http://bit.ly/bOR2XD

Let's await confirmation.

London Labour Party - command and control continues in Tower Hamlets

An item on my Facebook Newsfeed asks:

...who is this unknown guy [imposed by Region to stand in the Spitalfields by-election] Brick Laners are fuming about?

Is this what happened to members' rights under a new leader? Same old command and control and (question) another Labour council seat now in jeopardy.

The by-election follows the election of former Labour Councillor Lutfur Rahman as Mayor of Tower Hamlets (see Peter Kenyon blogs passim)

Tally ho! The Labour Party hunts down its prey - members with minds of their own

For a party that abolished fox-hunting, the blood lust inside the Labour Party seems to know no bounds. My scoop on the Tower Hamlets Labour Group meeting earlier this week in the House of Commons has flushed out some of the 'hunt' both here and on Twitter. The twisted thinking that they give vent to highlights a profound problem for all political parties in democratic societies. How do they cope with members who have minds of their own?

For right-wing Labourite commentatators such as Paul Richards and Luke Akehurst, the decision of Lutfur Rahman to run as an independent candidate for the elected mayoral post in Tower Hamlets meant not just automatic expulsion, but a denial of 'natural justice'. Labourpaul aka Paul Richards twittered:

@PeterKenyon basic democratic principle: if you join Labour, you can't back other candidates. Unity is strength, etc.

To which I replied:

@Labourpaul Basic democratic principle you ensure natural justice.

In a rapid fire exchange that followed Luke Akehurst delivered a triumphant blast on his hunting horn:

 @PeterKenyon You could have made the natural justice argument if he hadn't run vs Lab. By doing so Lutfur destroyed own case.

So there you have it from Labour First recruiting sergeant and member of the Hunt extraordinaire, we will hunt you down whatever.

Luke had set out his reaction to the news of Labour's defeat last Thursday here, the following day. As a former NEC member, I urged caution:

Dear Luke

As a member of the NEC that read the complaints lodged at short notice and some 72 hours before the close of nominations for candidates to run as for the position of elected mayor of TH, I urge you to focus on the allegations.

Either uphold them or dismiss them observing due process and the entitlement of all parties to natural justice.

I hope you have better luck than the previous NEC did over the Erith and Thamesmead ballot box break-in and voting paper tampering.

This goes to the nub of a problem facing Labour's new Leader: how can you aspire to mass-membership when at the first whiff of independent thinking there are other members baying to hunt down and expel them? For me the answer is simple. Labour has to have robust processes in place to protect all members' rights. The Lutfur Rahman case presents a real opportunity to examine member baiting, hunting and 'slaughter'.

I'm glad to see I am not alone in pressing for the inquiry proposed and voted for at the NEC on 21 September to be completed.

Trial by Jeory's recent post suggests:

Which way new party leader Ed Miliband nods his brainy head will be crucial. The feeling among senior Labour figures is that he will lay off Ken, but I suspect he will also order an investigation into the so-called “Abbas dossier”, which in fact was authored not only by Helal Abbas, but also a number of others involved in the shambolic Labour selection campaign.

If that investigation finds the dossier was as weak as some suspect and, depending on how Lutfur acts and performs as an independent Mayor, it is not inconceivable that he and others two years or so down the line could be readmitted into the fold.

Given the baying from the  hounds in Westminster as reported earlier today by Paul Waugh of the Evening Standard, Ed Miliband's obvious course of action is to insist the allegations against Lutfur Rahman are properly investigated and as a matter of urgency.

Those in the Parliamentary Labour Party scenting blood are right in one respect. Silence is not an option for our new Leader. Tally ho!

 

 

2.   
   @Labourpaul Basic democratic principle you ensure natural justice.

Tower Hamlets' MPs and Labour's NEC are risking further scandal

Labour lost the Tower Hamlet's elected Mayoral election on Thursday. So what's the machine's next move? Organise to undermine the democratically-elected mayor's efforts to form an administration.

According to respected local resident and journalist Ted Jeory's blog:

Labour’s London boss Ken Clark is understood to have decreed to his councillors that they can not remain in the party and serve with Lutfur. So anyone wanting to take Lutfur’s shilling will have to defect.

Note the possessive adjective 'his' councillors. What is going on? The London Labour Party's regional director is not in charge of a Politburo. He acts under authority from the National Executive Committee. We can be certain that there has been NO meeting of the NEC since the TH mayoral election.

What we do know is that some questionable allegations were made at an NEC meeting on 21 September against the winner of an all member ballot for the Labour Party nomination to stand for the post of elected mayor of TH. Questionable allegations? Well, yes. The accused was not given any chance to respond, so the allegations remain open to question.

My former Hackney Labour Party colleague, Luke Akehurst, a well known member of Labour First - the party within the Labour Party that continues to operate with impunity possibly contrary to Rule, opines that there are parallels to be drawn with Hackney in the mid-1990s. As the chief whip of Hackney Labour Group appointed in 1995 by the then London Obergruppenführer Terry Ashton, on the authority of Tom Sawyer, general secretary at the time, I am no stranger to the dark arts of Labour Party politics. Likening Tower Hamlets Labour Parties today to Hackney Labour Parties then is, Luke, both ill-informed and ill-advised.

There is a simple and straightforward opportunity for the Labour Party to make amends for years of unwarranted and gross interference in the rights of members in that borough. It commits to co-operating with the newly elected Mayor whilst maintaining its Manifesto commitments to the electorate in the May council elections.

Instead we have the unedifying prospect of an abuse of parliamentary facilities by the two Labour MPs hosting a Labour Group meeting in the Palace of Westminster allegedly to subvert the democratic will of the local electorate. Abuse? To book a room in Houses of Parliament requires the sponsorship of an MP. What's wrong with the usual facilities in TH?

I only hope the wires are buzzing tonight to stop the folly and enable an urgently needed rapproachment to take place between the victor and the Labour Party. I have never met Lutfur Rahman. But I know him as the only Labour Council leader who, when in office, secured support from his Council for a full set of recommendations concerning the implementation of a London Living Wage. As for all the allegations about Islamisation, I see that balanced and objective commentator Melanie Phillips has picked up the baton (again). Enough said.

An urgent review of the allegations leading to Lutfur Rahman's administrative suspension by Labour's NEC is needed as I have already suggested in unsolicited advice to Luke Akehurst on his blog. On the basis of what I know now, compared to a month ago - I would be inclined to say,  "Case dismissed". Lutfur Rahman should probably have been the official Labour Party candidate in the first place. At least that's what TH Labour Party members decided in a ballot administered by current Obergruppenführer Ken Clark. That's good enough for me. It's their right to decide under Labour Party Rules.

As for the local MPs, they are making a very good case for the urgent reintroduction of compulsory reselection of Labour sitting MPs as prospective parliamentary candidates.

Labour values back on track - living wage

Comrades in Tower Hamlets Labour Group last night showed real local leadership last night by tabling a resolution at full Council, which won near unanimous support, to implement the London Living Wage. (The London Labour Party backed the idea, actively promoted by former Labour Mayor, Ken Livingstone, at its biennial conference in 2006.)

Labour-controlled Tower Hamlets Council recently elected leader Cllr Lutfur Rahman proposed the motion telling himself to get on with it. The resolution reads:

This Council:

• supports the establishment of the London Living Wage, set at a level calculated

by the Living Wage Unit to avoid poverty wages being paid in the capital;

• abhors the fact that around 400,000 Londoners continue to fall into a ‘working

poverty trap’ because their families are paid less than required to fund the basic

costs of living in London;

• calls on the Leader to review Tower Hamlets Council’s procurement, contract and

best value policies to ensure that, as far as possible within UK and EU law, the

London Living Wage, at the level set by the GLA’s Living Wage Unit, is the

minimum paid by Tower Hamlets Council and by its contractors and that all

temporary workers employed by the council are paid at least £7.45 an hour by

their agency;

• calls on the Leader to seek commitments from Tower Hamlets’ partners in the

Local Strategic Partnership to pay no less than the London Living Wage; and

• calls on the Leader to ensure that the Council’s commitment to the London Living

Wage is clearly displayed on Council headed paper, the Council website and

other appropriate locations

To the best on my knowledge Tower Hamlets is the first Labour-controlled Council to implement the London Living Wage not just for its own staff, but agency and temporary workers as well as commit to seek contract compliance as Best Value contracts come up for renewal. I believe that this latest development in promoting the 'living income' concept is the next step in Labour's commitment to end poverty in the UK. It could be used by Labour Groups in every local authority in the country to mobilise members and supporters. 

 

I live in the City of London. It is a scandal that the Corporation has refused to become a London Living Wage Employer. If Tower Hamlets can afford to, the City has no excuse.