Peter Kenyon

Any more squalid selections in the spotlight? Or was Nottingham East the last?

4 pm April 20, 2010 - that's the deadline for nomination papers to be submitted for prospective parliamentary candidates. That's less than four working days away. Since the results of the Nottingham East 'selection' were announced late yesterday afternoon, I have been asking contacts on the Labour Party's Special Selection Panel and in the media about the prospects of yet more selections to come. Given how little time is left, any last minute 'resignations' by prospective parliamentary candidates would inevitably require a new candidate to be imposed - an ideal opportunity for the exercise of yet more patronage by the 'powers that be'.

Only two weeks ago, the Labour-supporting weekly Tribune magazine reported a possible further dozen 'redundancy runners'  resignations - MPs willing to step down to take advantage of generous payments for just not standing for parliament again under the corrupting allowances system of the last Parliament, now abolished. That was followed by a report of an even larger number in the Daily Telegraph on Easter Saturday. 'Up to 20 Labour MPs may stand down this week', its headline claimed. Nothing has happened. So far.

Reactions to my queries ranged from 'watch xxxxxxxxxxxxxx', who brusquely denied the suggestion when asked by a contact whom I knew would have the person's telephone number, to extreme doubt that any further stitch-ups were possible.

So I remain on alert to chronicle if necessary. Ideas about how to 'legislate' against these abuses inside the Labour Party in future would be welcome. Rebuilding trust between members, supporters, voters and their elected Labour Party respresentatives is going to take much longer.

Notts East selection: Chris Leslie gets nomination

Former MP Chris Leslie has been selected by the Labour Party's Special Selection Panel as its candidate in the Nottingham East parliamentary constituency.

He was chosen from a shortlist of nine by a panel of five NEC members, including Deputy Leader Harriet Harman and NEC chair Ann Black. 

The decision was reported by the FT's Jim Pickard here. And I can confirm from my own sources. Some reactions are best not repeated. It is rally round time.

UPDATE: the decision was another split vote Leslie 3 : Taylor 2

Selection in the spotlight: Nottingham East - Jolly good show or crying shame?

Tomorrow, the Labour Party will interview nine candidates and select one to represent it in the Nottingham East parliamentary constituency. Controversially, its Special Selection Panel (SSP) voted 8 to 7 last week to impose a candidate on the constituency.

CLP officers, Nottingham City Council Labour Group members and the outgoing MP, John Heppell met yesterday in Birmingham on the margins of the Labour Party 2010 Manifesto launch to help shortlist for interview from some 100 applicants. Congratulations to local CLP members for successfully lobbying for 1) an OPEN selection, and 2) getting a say at least for their CLP officers and local councillors. They have definitely got local candidates short-listed for interview. They include Councillors Jon Collins, Brian Parbutt and Jane Urquhart. In addition, four black asian and minority ethnic candidates have made the cut, plus two rival 'national' names, former MP Chris Leslie and the Trade Union and Labour Party Liaison national secretary, Byron Taylor.

Tomorrow, the interviewing panel of five NEC members have an opportunity to make partial amends for local members being denied a say. They can ensure an open and fair selection on merit. It's a choice between the new and old politics. A narrowing of opinion inside the Labour's NEC was demonstrated by the closeness of the vote to impose a candidate last Thursday. It was only carried by the votes of Leader Gordon Brown and Deputy Leader Harriet Harman. Had either one of them voted in favour of, retaining members' rights to a say then there would have been no need for this blog.

They and their advisers all have a chance to rethink their positions.

Their difficulties with regard to Nottingham East arise from persistent rumours that No 10 (ie. Gordon Brown) wants former MP Chris Leslie to be the next MP for the seat, That line was blogged again yesterday by BBC Newsnight political editor Michael Crick. The interview panel could wrest back some of its tarnished reputation by not bothering to consult with No. 10 about whom they are minded to impose select. According to the Nottingham Evening Post:

A spokesman for the Prime Minister told the Evening Post that Mr Brown had no preferred candidate.

As Gordon Brown himself reminded everyone at the Manifesto launch yesterday:

- And which is the party of political reform, offering more democratic change than at any time in 100 years and more? .... the party with the plan for the future. And I say to you today: the future will be progressive or conservative, but it will not be both.

Quite so. The age of deference is over. What better place to demonstrate precisely what that means than the selection of candidates to fight the general election.

So its up to Deputy Leader Harriet Harman, USDAW's Paddy Lillis, Keith Vaz MP, NEC chair Ann Black and her vice chair, Norma Stephenson to do the decent thing. We know that both Ann and Norma voted last week AGAINST imposing a candidate. Of the three imposers on the NEC panel, Keith Vaz represents the Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic section.  He has aroused considerable controversy by his role in selections to date, and faces allegations after the election from that constituency of not ensuring a robust equalities approach. Tomorrow is his chance to show he embraces the new politics, and that the age of prime ministerial patronage is over. Quite what unionised shopworkers will make of Paddy Lillis, their deputy general secretary's forelock tugging to No. 10 beats me. As for Harriet, she has much to answer for concerning these fast track selections chronicled here and elsewhere. 

This 2010 election is, as we were reminded repeatedly yesterday, about 'people not posters'. Well, where better to start than with the people who are signed up as members of the Labour Party in Nottingham East, and those whose votes they seek to ensure a Labour MP in the next Parliament?

As the interviews will be taking place in the Jolly St Ermins Hotel in London, it will either be a jolly good show, or a crying shame. A decision is expected mid-afternoon.

Labour Party outstanding selections - Nottingham East and....?

Just because a general election has been called does not mean that my selections in the spotlight series is off air. Quite the contrary, we have now entered a period during which members' rights in selecting parliamentary candidates are at greatest risk of abuse by powerful individuals among the Labour Party leadership.

Particularly puzzling is an inordinate delay in the designation of Nottingham East vacated by John Heppel two weeks ago. My sources tell me that the Special Selections Panel was told by Party staff that the CLP had not been consulted. That is most unfortunate, as the sitting Labour MP's intentions were discussed by members at the CLP's AGM two weeks ago and a view formed as to how the vacancy for a prospective parliamentary candidate should be filled.

To reinforce the message for an OPEN selection with local candidates a petition to the NEC has been signed by (at the last count notified to me) nearly 200 members.

The Special Selections Panel is due to decide today whether it should be open or an all womens' shortlist.

My worry and that of members in Nottingham East is that there will be enormous pressure for candidates to be imposed. That concern has only been heightened by unsubstantiated rumours of yet more sitting Labour MPs making the redundancy run and pocketing up to £65K stepping down. I only hope that's all completely untrue, otherwise I fear I could be very busy staying off message, but defending members' rights, rather than out on the doorstep in marginal seats.

Selection in the spotlight: Stoke Central - be grateful peasants

The Labour Party's fasttrack selection process for Stoke Central has produced a shortlist reportedly of three candidates. How the chosen three candidates are received and treated by members of the local constituency labour party at a hustings due to take place on Thursday remains to be seen. I have long since lost confidence in the fasttrack selection process and those administering it. The question for the majority of my colleagues on the National Executive Committee is whether they have too and are prepared to act to challenge this latest shortlisting decision.

For those who have forgotten these are the key words from a National Executive Committee resolution agreed nem con last November:

When the General Election is called the right of members to select their candidates will remain a priority consideration for the panel.

The operative words are 'will remain a priority'. I know we merely entrust the government of the country to the Leader of the Party that won the last General Election. We depends on the words Parliament chooses to enshrine in statute to determine how we are governed, and in the event of dispute those words help guide the judiciary when forming a judgment in any case arising there from.

So the 'right of members to select their candidates' is a priority given that a General Election has not been called? Apparently not. For my part, I would readily support a resolution calling for an emergency meeting of the NEC to overturn the delegated powers of the Special Selections Panel, with a view to removing the undue influence (if any) of the Leader/deputy leader and trade union donors from remaining selections. The concern is that by their actions to date they could be seen as bringing the Labour Party into disrepute, just like the Lobbygate Three/Four/Six. The cause for concern is that s/he/they are undermining trust in our democracy and our elected political representatives. In the case of Stoke, it is alleged that a candidate preferred by an unelected member of the Labour Party leadership, to whom the elected Leader (by default) is possibly beholden, is one of three shortlisted persons.

Members in Stoke Central will no doubt be reflecting very carefully on how their rights have been compromised and asking whether they have any means of registering their concerns.

Labour Party ends postal ballots for fast-track candidate selections

All remaining Labour Party prospective parliamentary candidate (PPC) selections will be decided by those constituency labour party members able to attend a hustings meeting. There will be no postal ballots from now on, and this decision includes the selections already underway in Stoke Central, and Halesown and Rowley Regis.

Quite why this membership entitlement to participate has been stripped away is a bit of a mystery. An official note is awaited.

There is no guarantee that even a vote at a hustings will be continued after the General Election is called, even though it was agreed at this week's national executive committee that no candidates should be imposed whatever the circumstances of a vacancy.

Selection in the spotlight: Nottingham East

It's official. There is another vacancy for a parliamentary seat in Nottinghamshire. This time it is Nottingham East according to this report in the local paper. This confirms local speculation reported here last Saturday that such an eventuality might occur though for entirely different reasons from those cited by me.

John Heppell MP is standing down according to the online service This is Nottingham as his wife has breast cancer.

I wish her a speedy recovery, him a comfortable retirement and the members of Nottingham East CLP an open and transparent process to select a new prospective pariamentary candidate with no repeat of the Ashfield gambit.

Selections in the spotlight: E Lothian and Mboro S

According to the latest posting on the National Parliamentary Panel page on Membersnet, the Labour Party intranet service, East Lothian will be an All Women Shortlist and Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland will be Open.

Applications have to be received by the Special Selections Panel by midday on 29 March, with shortlisting in both cases two days later on 31 March.

Selection in the spotlight: Islwyn - misinformation official

The Labour Party's capacity to upset local activists continues unrestrained on the other side of Offa's Dyke. Having been 'instructed' by former Hackney Council chief whip, Luke Akehurst to put a sock in it, I feel compelled to highlight misinformation being attributed by the South Wales media to outgoing Islwyn MP Don Touhig and an unnamed Labour Party official.

Earlier this week Mr Touhig was reported as saying:

"Labour Party procedure has been followed and party members will now get the opportunity to select a candidate from a talented short-list."

Who chose the talented short-list?

According to the latest story in the South Wales Argus:

A Welsh Labour spokesman said: "Labour's Prospective Parliamentary Candidates are chosen by local Labour members in a democratic vote, and to suggest that the Labour Party's selection process is anything other than fair would be completely wrong."

It is true to say there will be a democratic vote. But it is not the whole truth and nothing but the truth to say:

to suggest that the Labour Party's selection process is anything other than fair would be completely wrong."

On the contrary, the longlisting, interviewing and shortlisting process now being used is so opaque and lacking in 'fairness' as to be bringing the Labour Party into disrepute. Not very smart, IMHO, under any circumstances, let alone with a general election only weeks away. There is no reason why within the Labour Party's NEC fasttrack procedure that all applicants CVs could not have been made available to members electronically. (The Labour Party has its own intranet to which all members can have access). There is no reason why all members and or their elected constituency party officials could not have been asked to longlist candidates for interview, and then been offered observer rights at the interview sessions leading to shortlisting.

The usual excuse advanced for not adopting such methods is that it excludes those not on eMail. What would be better? Local members encouraged to participate and enable those lacking eliteracy to do likewise or preventing all members from taking part in longlisting through to the shortlist? Bit of a no-brainer for those of us campaigning to retain and recruit members.

So my sympathies go out to comrades past and present in Wales who object to being cheated of their rights to select candidates from the moment a vacancy arises to the declaration of the selection ballot. One would have thought the Labour Party would have learned its lesson after the infamous Blaenau Gwent defeat. Not so it would appear. Misleading members and the public about the new arrangements is not going to help win the next election. So Mr Touhig, who did chose the short-list? And why were local members given no say in the process?

Selection in the spotlight: Ashfield! Parachutist alert

The latest polling trends are very encouraging in one sense - the prospect of a Labour win. But the behaviour of the 'powers that be' continues to give cause for concern. Unless challenged the Labour Party will remain institutionally undemocratic.

Ashfield CLP and its Womens' Forum are reported to have expressed a preference for an OPEN shortlist. There is disquiet that the job of retaining the seat will be made more difficult following the designation of the fast-track selection to replace Geoff Hoon as an  All Women Shortlist.  That was decided by unspecified criteria by the Labour Party's National Executive Committee's (no declarations of interest necessary) Special Selection Panel. The latest development is that members were being rung ahead of publication of a story in today's Mail on Sunday about a particular individual here.

The first paragraph reads:

A bid to parachute in Tony Blair's favourite broadcaster as a candidate for a safe Labour seat at the General Election has outraged party activists.

The tragedy for any alleged parachutist is that the individual(s) concerned might meet a set of longlisting/shortlisting critieria acceptable to local members. But the absolute determination of the 'powers that be' to ride roughshod over the Labour Party grassroots sullies their reputation and that of the Party.

The best advice I can suggest is for local party officials to demand to see the CVs of all the applicants.