Rebranding

The Mirror has the inside track on these things and appears to confirm rumours that Ed Miliband's big idea is to rebrand 'New' Labour. A better logo, a new prefix and bingo - your goblin army is once again fit for purpose. Not that he's renaming New Labour "Goblin Army", that would be just too inspired.

According to Kevin MacGuire;

TALK has started in Ed Miliband’s circle of what to call the Labour Party after he declared “New” Labour dead.

Plain Labour was deemed boring so he’s mulling over fresh descriptions.

Newer, Newest, Renewed and Radical were kicked about. But one very prominent figure, I hear, wants Miliband to adopt Progressive Labour.

The idea is to appear edgy and hoover up unhappy Lib Dems without frightening traditionalists. How very New Labour!

I agree "Plain Labour" would have been an error. As would "Normal Labour", "Everyday Labour" or even "Ordinary Labour" - however each of those would be preferable to the pig's particles that is the phrase "Progressive Labour". The members will hate it!

I have absolutely no idea what is meant to be edgy about the word progressive, I use it myself from time to time, but usually to described left leaning ideas that aren't so left leaning I want to call them left, let alone socialist. Progressive usually describes things like not being too racist, or too homophobic or that people should probably pay their tax.

Essentially things that we'd like to think everyone believes, although sadly that's far from true.

Certainly Miliband's tenure so far has not been particularly noted for its "edgyness" either. Condemning strike action, then pottering about while muttering under his breath - and voters hope he's muttering about the cuts but for all we know he's reciting the lyrics to the Mister Ed theme tune.

As Darrell says "Once again we are reminded of how depressingly hollow Miliband’s commitment to Labour values actually is." I actually think it's quite funny, but then I'm weird like that.

I'll get my raincoat - a riposte

I loathe and despise blog rows where one blogger denounces another at length and it goes round in circles until everyone feels sick. However, just for once I'll use this space to disagree with Carl at Raincoat Optimism over 'sectarianism' because, hopefully, it will be a friendly disagreement. And anyway, "it's good to talk" as Bob Hoskins used to say on that advert encouraging us run our phone bills up.

Carl wrote earlier today a post that is a hybrid between a history lesson on the Independent Labour Party (ILP) and an opportunity to say that "refusal to work in the Labour Party, from the ILP back in the thirties to the Greens and the SWP now, is the scourge of left wing politics."

If he'd written about a refusal to work *with* the Labour Party I might not have bothered, cooperating with people you disagree with on specific points of agreement is healthy, but working *in* it? That's different.

But first the history. I'd like to defend the ILP from Carl's assertion that it as a "small, inadequate left wing part[y] shout[ing] in the wind, by the sidelines". I think this is far too harsh.

Firstly the ILP left the Labour Party in 1932 when it was in crisis Labour having played an utterly shameful role in government. Although a smallish organisation (with less than ten thousand members) it provided a strong left current outside of Stalinism, provided trade union militants who were not in the pockets of the large political organisations and, crucially, aided the Spanish revolution organisation aid and volunteers to fight in the POUM.

I think all of that was worth while and were a real contribution to the political moment quite distinct from Labour, who were a shower at the time. While I've no intention of defending every action of the ILP inside Labour they would have found making this contribution more difficult not less.

Which brings me on to today. For Carl we need to be inside "the Labour Party, currently in opposition to a government demanding ideological cuts over jobs and growth", but I think this ignores something pretty basic, which is that people like myself are for things as well as against them.

The current Labour position is that the deficit should not be halved in three years but in four. My economic position is that we should not be cutting public sector spending, but rather investing in the future. If I joined Labour it would be harder to argue that case for investment, not easier, so why should I spend my time campaigning for candidates who think the opposite of what I think?

There is a basic principle here - my politics are not the same as Labour's. Labour have consistently gone into General Elections saying that the market should have a greater involvement in public services, saying that the occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq were good and, while I have collected money for strikers, they have denounced them. I don't think Labour wants me anymore than I want to join them.

There's loads of people in Labour I have a real respect for, mainly the grass roots activists, but while I love and hug and kiss left Labour MP's like John MacDonnell I could never do what he does. Going to the polls on a manifesto that I disagree with from the header on the front page to the "printed and published" on the back he doesn't agree with a word of it.

It just doesn't feel honest to me. Voters deserve candidates whose politics match their parties, at least in general.

Now, it's all very well saying people on the left are sectarian for not being members of the Labour Party but what if I don't want to support candidates in favour of war? What if I think the economy needs to be regeared towards the ecological crisis? Is it sectarian to have political disagreements. Surely it would only be sectarian to refuse to join even though I agreed with their policies? But I don't.

Members of the SWP want a workers' revolution and think Parliamentary democracy is shit. Seeing as there is a very clear dividing line between that position and the position of every Labour leader and manifesto since its inception it seems pretty sensible for them to go elsewhere for their political sustenance.

Political pluralism does seem to annoy many in Labour, which is one reason I guess they've never tried to introduce proportional representation, but I'm afraid it's a fact of life - they really are other ways of thinking than inside the Labour/Tory horse race.

None of this means small parties are better than big ones. It doesn't even mean having different politics means being 'purist'. Labour don't think a watered down version of what I think, they actually think the opposite - at least on the big things like war, privatisation and ecological devastation. It's not purism that stops me being a Labour Party member but the fact I don't agree with their policies. Seems pretty reasonable to me.

Ed Miliband: the cleverest man in politics

It has become de rigeur in political circles to denounce Labour's 'new' leader. At least, I think it has, I'm not 100% certain what de rigeur means - but I've heard the clever boys use the term in this sort of context so I hope it isn't slang for a cervical smear or anything. "He's like a lifeless jelly" they say. "Less a leader, more an intangible feeling of discomfort." That sort of thing.

But, gentle reader, I crave your indulgence for a moment because I believe this fashion is quite, uite wrong. Yes, like any Zen Master he's making his genius seem effortless. Yes, like any Kung Foo champion he achieves his aims with just a slight twist to his shoulder or gliding step to the side - but let's not mistake this for lack of mastery.

So mist like is his appearance that you see the Coaltion forces growing more and more disconcerted at the lack of opposition. Like children camping they an't work out if there's a monster out there or not. They turn on their torches, they start at a snapping twig, they start to argue, "Look, there is no Labour Party, it doesn't exist!" The other child starts crying, "Labour are out there and they're going to eat us raw!"

The Coalition announces cuts in housing benefits that will result in misery and homelessness and Miliband just looks at them. It's not even a glare. just looks right through them. Not-saying-a-word. So they're left shufflng their feet until the Lib Dem blurts out "I didn't want to do it, it's him, he wanted to put down their pets. After all why should people have pets if they can't pay the rent?" Miliband doesn't move, he just keeps on staring.

Then the Lib Dems start staggering around clutching their throats "We're dying! We're dying!" the shriek, but it can't be Labour's fault can it - after all they haven't moved a muscle? So they turn on one another.

Voters against members, members against MPs, MPs against leader and leader, baring his arse to a shocked world, against all of them. Meanwhile Miliband watches, as if to say "I am stone. As life comes and goes about me, I am rock. Let rivers rage and thunder crash, what are these effemeral twitiches to the aeons?"

As libraries shut, offices close, unemployment rises and riots flare across the streets all we see are Lib Dems and Tories racing round setting light to schools, and urinating on our armed forces (but only the living ones, never the dead).

Of course, Labour's ranks are not all schooled in Miliband's teachings. Some cluck and splutter "Do something!" They shout "Call someone a bigot! Announce a policy initiative! Issue a press release! Do something!"

Miliband stops breathing, a hint of a frown crosses his face, but just for a moment. Holding up one finger he silences them. A deathly quiet falls. "Listen." One brave Labour acolyte steps forwards, and trembling asks "Wh... what is that sound? It's cutting me to the quick... horrible..." she breathes, eyes wide.

"It is the weeping of my enemies."

He places his hand back in his lap and continues the vigil over the Coalition's misrule. He whispers to himself "soon they will come and beg for our return, but not yet, let them twist a little more, let them see what life is like without me a while longer." Look at the polls and tell me I'm wrong.

Labour's racist current: Woolas edition

I do feel sorry for Labour. It's been simply months since they've been allowed to lock up a child because of the colour of its parent's passports. It's been months since they've been able to bomb foreign parts and then claim they've "moved on". The poor darlings have had thirteen years of scapegoating, discriminating against, murdering and imprisoning various dark skinned individuals, so it must be difficult coming to terms with the idea that you no longer get to be the big man in the big house.

It's always been a quandary for Labour Prime Ministers. Which foreigners you bombs, which ones you torture, which ones you lock up and which ones you allow to hoover your living room at the minimum wage. I feel for them, because these are hard decisions.

No wonder Labour MPs are kicking up a stink when one of their own is getting his comeuppance. While the leadership understand what's required of them in the press with words of condemnation for Phil Woolas, the MPs are far less disciplined.

Here you can watch Ed Miliand put clear water between himself and the man that only weeks ago he'd promoted to the shadow cabinet - to the position of shadow immigration minister of all things. He knows which side his bread is buttered. Harriet Harman, the deputy leader of the Labour Party has been taking flack from MPs for her unambiguous statement that people like Woolas had no place in Parliament.

It seems a significant number of MPs are willing to rise up and mutiny in defense of lying, whipping up racial tensions and plain old fashioned hate. They're even raising funds for the man. This local news report (starts 12 mins 50) makes it clear exactly how bad Woolas' campaign was, and that his campaign team was utterly complicit and seem to have no regrets. You can also read the judgment here.

Thankfully not everyone is at one with this. Liberal Conspiracy is rightly organising a defense of Harriet Harman. Whatever you think of her (and I've always had a soft spot for Harman) it's extremely important that the Labour Party is not dragged down into the Neanderthal swamps of Woolas and his co-thinkers.

It was down the line stupidity for Ed Miliband to make this man a shadow minister so close to his court case, opening the party up to such a crisis, but more seriously it showed that Ed Miliband was far from a fresh new left approach to politics by appointing this loathsome individual to such a high position on the eve of his disgrace.

Woolas has a long history of scapegoating immigrants and his enforced retirement is long overdue, it's just sad that it is the courts that brought this about rather than any of the three party leaders he's served under - Blair, Brown and Miliband who appear to have consistently rewarded rather than challenged his approach.

There has always been a racist current in the Labour Party, just as there has always been a current of decent people who anyone would proud to call their friends. Sadly it is the reactionaries who've had their hands on the levers of policy for some time. By the looks of it the dark heart of racism on the Labour benches is far from dead.

Recommended further reading: Paperback rioter.

Kentish Town: Bad Politics Watch

This week I've picked up a leaflet from the Tories which attacked Labour leader Ed Miliband for being a Manchester United supporter (yes, really) and witnessed the Lib Dems destroy the economy simultaneously with any chances of future electoral support. So when I saw the following attack leaflet in its proud blue inks I thought "bloody Tories, more personalised attacks".

Indeed it's a pretty terrible leaflet (click images to see in detail, but they're quite big files) which includes printing candidates home addresses along with a handy map to help any baying mobs in the vicinity to track them down. While it's publicly available information there's something distinctly creepy about ensuring every single member of the public gets a street map to help them find the candidates of the other parties.

The map is something the Tories had used before and coupled with the blue you immediately think you're reading a Tory leaflet which really, really goes for the throat against their coalition partners. Not nice for the Lib Dems but a miscalculation for the Tories too as the public aren't keen on this kind of attack politics - particularly when it gets personal..

Hold on though... where's the Tory logo? In fact, where's any logo of any kind? Where are the contact details? Where's the exhortation to vote for a party? Weird - there's none of that. But this is a leaflet being delivered to every home during a tight byelection... surely someone's responsible?

It's in there, but you'll have to look hard for it. Take your time... here's a clue: you might need a magnifying glass.

Here's another clue, it's not on the front page... give up?

OK. Back page, bottom left hand corner in what I estimate to be point four text size we have the words "Printed and promoted by an on behalf of Camden Labour Party, all at 110 Glouster Avenue, NW1 8HX". That is the only indication on the entire leaflet that this was produced and distributed by the Labour Party.

If I was deliberately distributing rival candidates addresses with a map marking their homes I'd be fucking ashamed as well, no wonder they don't want people to know who's responsible.

This is exactly the sort of thing that we need to see the back of in politics. I've no problem with attacking the politics or record of other parties but you should do so honestly and propose alternatives in their place. This is a deliberate attempt to deceive the public and should have no place in a democracy which relies on properly informed voters. By putting out a fake Tory leaflet of this kind Labour have shown themselves to politically bankrupt and Labour candidate Jenny Headlam-Wells should hang her head.

Tower Hamlets Mayoral election: oh my

Last night the people of Tower Hamlets shook the political establishment that's quite tired of being shaken thank you very much and elected Lutfur Rahman the expelled Labour candidate with more than fifty percent of the vote.

Results in full:

Rahman	Lutfur	Independent	23283	51.76%
Abbas	Helal Uddin	Labour	11254	25.02%
King	Neil	Conservative	5348	11.89%
Griffiths	John	Liberal Democrat	2800	6.22%
Duffell	Alan	Green Party	2300	5.11%

On a very low turnout (meaning that the elections cost four quid for every vote cast!) the Labour Party were despondent on the night even though when sorting through twitter earlier in the day you'd have found the Tower Hamlets thread clogged up with their supporters - it's almost as if twitter doesn't matter! The very thought...

Labour are blaming everyone but themselves for this defeat. Ken Livingstone for having a walkabout with Lutfur, the turnout, postal fraud, their own voters - everyone except themselves.

Having been duly selected as the Labour Party candidate Lutfur was promptly hoofed out and replaced by the third placed candidate Abbas. If the Party had a problem with Lutfur then they should never have let him stand for the role or be a leading member of their party in the area for years.

It seems they haven't learned their previous lessons about how damaging this kind of control freakery can be. Time and again Labour (and it is always Labour, no one else does this) stitch up selection processes from the centre and then the decision comes back to bite them.

Livingstone's first Mayoral run, the Welsh Party leadership, the Blaenau Gwent candidacy and in Scotland the case of Dennis Canavan are all examples where Labour's desire to control the Party have meant that they sabotaged their own party and, in the end, didn't get their way anyway either. There's a lesson for all parties there that no seat is safe, you can always fuck it up.

So far there have been expulsions from the Labour's council group as well as the candidate and it looks like Labour have managed to lose control of a borough that has been solid Labour for almost a century.

PS Well done to tower Hamlets Greens for their very positive campaign and good result, I know they're very happy today. A little more and we'd have beaten the lib Dems... next time comrades!

Meg Hillier: proof Ed Miliband doesn't care about climate change

The more I think about Meg Hillier the less I like her, that's nothing to do with her attitude to foxes mind. Nothing personal, I'm sure she loves kittens and can make a crying baby sleep at fifty paces but, as the main person responsible for holding the Coalition to account on climate change she is the just the wrong choice. 

Yesterday I posted a link to the new shadow Minister of Energy and Climate Change's Public Whip account which shows her woeful voting record. Stuart has summarised it here.

To summarise Stuart's summary it appears that she's voted against improvements in housing energy use efficiency, she's voted against limiting civil aviation pollution, was for Heathrow's expansion, in fact according to Public Whip she has a poor voting record on the issue for a Labour MP, let alone compared to the Tories, et al.

Don't worry though, she's 100% for nuclear power. That will sort things out. 

Today the Guardian summed up her record so far like this;

As for the real Meg Hillier, she's not known to have had a deep interest in climate change. A former journalist (like climate secretary, Chris Huhne) and privately educated (like Huhne), she was elected for the first time in 2005 as MP for Hackney South and Shoreditch, having been mayor of Islington and a member of the London assembly. Probably most useful for her new job among her interests are the work she has done on housing and transport (well, bus routes). In government, she spent a year working for Ruth Kelly at the Department of Communities and Local Government, then three as a Home Office minister juggling the identity card hot potato.

Just checking to see if she has any interest in climate change...

Yup. That checks out then.

So we've been told that Ed Miliband was the best candidate on climate change, but if that's the case why has he appointed someone who has no interest in climate change to shadow the issue? What possible justification could there be for appointing someone who votes against climate change measures to spearhead your approach to climate change?

Where's this fresh new Labour Party then?

Personally I think Labour is going through a bit of an opposition bounce. They seem happier in themselves now they're not in charge of any wars or recessions, which has resulted in a detectable spring in their step in some quarters. Also some voters who had strayed from the fold seem to be tentatively returning to their old pastures.

I'm not detecting any specific Ed Miliband bounce though among party members, which is hardly surprising as he wasn't the members' choice for leader.

During the leadership election there weren't many highs or interesting points, but one of them was certainly Ed Balls' clarity over taking a new direction on the economy. I have many critical things to say about the man, as we'll come to, but I think he showed himself to be both an articulate and passionate advocate for a more left field economic strategy.

He seemed to want to put investment in public services and protecting ordinary people from these devastating cuts before this imaginary 'need' to cut the deficit right down, right now. I even developed some respect for the man. I think we can do much better, but he won a great deal of respect from former critics for his robust and brave approach which cut against the Westminster consensus.

Sadly, his virtues were seen as vices to the new leader, and having outlined an entirely different economic approach to New Labour's coy 'not quite so hard, not quite so fast' rhetoric Miliband was in a position where he either appointed Balls as shadow treasurer and adopted his position, or appointed someone entirely unBallslike in his stead in order to keep ploughing the same furrow. Miliband chose the steady option with Alan Johnson.

So where to put him?

Having refused to place the best candidate for chancellor in the shadow chancellor slot he faced a new problem - where to put Balls that was high enough that it didn't look like a purge of his rivals but where Balls could not pronounce on the economy. The Home Office.

Sadly Ed Balls is bloody awful on immigration and has a track record that would make any decent person blush on the issue. During the leadership race he raised the 'immigration problem' more than once and came up with such delightful ideas of preventing 'remittances', where immigrants send money home to their families living in poverty, which would directly result in misery in some of the poorest communities on Earth.

So now not only has Ed Miliband in one stroke refused to take a more left leaning approach to the economy he's appointed one of the most anti-immigrant Labour candidates to make pronouncements on immigration. Where's Miliband's fresh new approach?

To make matters worse Phil Woolas, who is utter scum, and has been at the forefront of Ministerial racism for some time has been appointed to hold Balls' coat while he kicks the heads of migrant workers. The man should have been expelled from the party years ago, not rewarded with a shadow cabinet post.

What a disgrace that Ed Miliband has taken a conscious choice not just to reject fresh new thinking on the economy, but has embraced two of the least deserving MPs to become his spokespersons on immigration. Not just old thinking, but some of the most backwards and rancid old thinking you can find.

Labour's shadow cabinet

So, the results for Labour's shadow cabinet are in. Let's take a look at the winners.

Yvette Cooper	232 votes
John Healey	192 votes
Ed Balls	179 votes
Andy Burnham	165 votes
Angela Eagle	165 votes
Alan Johnson	163 votes
Douglas Alexander	160 votes
Jim Murphy	160 votes
Tessa Jowell	152 votes
Caroline Flint	139 votes
John Denham	129 votes
Hilary Benn	128 votes
Sadiq Khan	128 votes
Mary Creagh	119 votes
Ann McKechin	117 votes
Maria Eagle	107 votes
Meg Hillier	106 votes
Ivan Lewis	104 votes
Liam Byrne	100 votes

Yvette Cooper in top? Who'd have thought it, and I've not even heard of John Healey the guy who strolled in at second place. All in all a pretty Blairite bunch. People who supervised ID cards, or were gung ho for war - but some names are less worse than others, I'll concede that. Still, it doesn't feel like moving on really.

I'm unsurprised that Abbott, with 59 votes, was not in the list although Peter Hain who missed out by just 3 votes was a bit of a shock. The fact that Shaun Woodward did not make it is unsurprising, but I thought David Lammy might have edged in. At least he got plenty more votes than Stephen Twigg.

Is Labour moving to the right?

Most members of the Labour Party (like the MPs) voted for David Miliband ahead of his brother and successful leadership candidate Ed. It's tempting to see this as a shift to the right on the part of the members, but we do need to remember the last time they were given the chance to elect a leader they choose Tony Blair so that would have to be some shift!

However, a lesser noticed election was taking place at the same time as all these other exciting outward facing posts like Mayor of London and Leader of the Party. Yes, the members were also electing six members of their NEC.

I believe each member has six votes in this election and, of the winning candidates, the results were;

Ken Livingstone: 88,235
Oona King: 64,004
Ann Black: 59,200
Ellie Reeves: 45,481
Christine Shawcroft: 44,338
Luke Akehurst: 30,825

Obviously, with a girlish giggle, you look at Ken's name at the top and do a happy little dance. But more to the point the members have actually elected more candidates from the right of the party than they normally do with Luke Akehurst and Oona King both in the winners' circle.

Oona's vote is particularly impressive and shows that the Mayoral result will not be her death knell in politics, more's the pity. I've a lot more time for Mr Akehurst who expresses his politics honestly and works hard for candidates of the left even when he clearly disagrees with them. He'll be a hard working and competant member of the NEC I don't doubt.

That doesn't change the fact that the members appear to have shifted to the right and good left wingers like Susan Press who, in earlier years, may well have been elected were unable to muster enough support this time round.

Perhaps this is all Kremlinology or reading the entrails of birds but it seems to me that the NEC results may well indicate that the right are slowly but surely strangling what little remains of the left in the party.

Unions decide leader of the Labour Party

And so it came to pass, the person who got the most votes from the members didn't win the Labour Leadership selection. Welcome Ed Miliband, the brother whose smile leans to the left, as the new opposition leader.

As predicted it was a toss up between Ed and David Miliband, but the nature of the electoral college system where three colleges (MPs/MEPs, members and unions and affiliates) each count for a third of the vote each.

David won more MPs/MEPs *and* more party members in the vote but because the unions gave their support so heavily to Ed it was the younger brother that won. Well done him.

Final round results;

David Miliband 49.35%

17.812 from MPs/MEPs, 18.135 from members, 13.40 from unions and affiliates

Ed Miliband 50.65%

15.522 from MPs/MEPs, 15.198 from members, 19.934 from unions and affiliates

For those who are interested in the breakdown you can find it here. You wont be surprised to hear that Diane Abbott was first to fall, then Andy Burnham and in third place was Ed Balls.

What was more interesting was that Diane came last in the members' vote, which was always the one she was going to have to crack if she was to do well. You will not be shocked to know that Andy Burnham did not do well with the unions.

What the implications of this election will be is any one's guess. Labour members will hope that a more soft left posing Miliband will help rejuvenate their vote - but let's see how they take on Post Office privatisation, the ongoing occupation of Afghanistan and trident replacement.

Livingstone rides again

Good news. Ken Livingstone has been selected by Labour as their new Mayoral candidate for London with over two thirds of the vote.


The results, announced earlier today, give Londoners the best chance of ridding themselves of Boris Johnson in 2012 - should they choose to do so.

The election was conducted on the basis of two votes - those of Labour members in London and those from the trade unions. Livingstone won 66% of the members vote and 71% of the trade union vote, making his victory pretty decisive.

One disadvantage of the system Labour use in these elections is that it constantly creates the possibility of electing someone against the wishes of the members. Anyone who remembers the first London Mayoral election will remember how Livingstone lost the Labour selection despite winning the overwhelming backing of the members, creating massive problems for Labour, if not Ken himself.

If we look at the case of the current Labour leadership vote which is using three blocks: MPs, unions and members - creating the very real possibility of David Miliband becoming the next leader without any kind of endorsement from the members.

That's their lookout of course, but it seems strange to design a system where members vote for one candidate and someone else can be elected.

NB Green Assembly Member Jenny Jones shares her thoughts on this with Mayor Watch.

Camden Labour Leadership Hustings

There was a very strong turnout in Camden Town Hall tonight to hear a joint Labour Leadership and London Mayoral hustings. I was only able to stay for the leadership bit but thought it was rather interesting.

Almost the first thing that happened was the mere mention of Oona King provoked a stirring boo from the crowd as she'd pulled out at the last minute, something that a fellow attendee told me "She'd been making a habit of round London."

That doesn't seem very wise as, with a room full of Labour members, losing a dozen votes at a stroke (if you discount all the Ken supporters) is just a bit silly and arrogant.

We then heard that Andy Burnham had pulled out at last minute too which left just Diane Abbott as the only candidate present. The other pretenders to the throne were represented by substitutes of varying quality. David Miliband pulled in Charlie Faulkner, which I think counts as a big hitter and taking the hustings seriously, but the other candidates had more modest substitutes.

Ed Miliband even had a spokesperson who said *three times* that he'd already voted Diane 1 Ed 2. My partner thought this was a tactic and about winning second preferences, personally I thought it was just a poor, poor choice of advocate.

Anyway, as to content it was all a bit of a disappointment. Abbott was strong on name checking all the bugbears of the left: ID cards, the war, ten pence tax, detention of children, bankers are evil, housing et al. As she said in her closing statement "On all those big issues I called them right and every other candidate got them wrong."

Faulkner/David Miliband essentially put up a defence of the Labour government's record and made a clear pitch as the continuity candidate. Balls' speaker was very strong on the economy and robust in her advocacy of more investment, not less, as well as surprisingly supporting the Robin Hood Tax.

It was left to Diane though to say that Labour "should not roll over and die in the face of Tory assaults" and accept the idea that cuts are inevitable, nor that *these* cuts are inevitable. She said "we will not cut our way out of the recession, we have to grow our way out of it." I agree.

Compare that to Faulkner who said a) he opposed all the Tory cuts he'd heard about b) cuts were inevitable and c) if only it was Labour doing the cutting! Both morally reprehensible *and* logically inconsistent, good work Charlie.

The excitement of the evening came with a sharp question on youth justice and the failure of the criminal justice system when it came to young people. "Andy" and Diane made good cases for economic and social justice reducing crime although it was only Diane who got a round of applause for her very clear "Prison - does - not - work".

Again Faulkner defended the record of the government and was duly rewarded by a slanging match from the floor. Frankly it was good to see some passion and good to see a room full of Labour members uncomfortable with Labour's record.

All in all it was clearly Diane's (and Ken's) audience, and not just because she was the only candidate present, but because the audience liked what she had to say. When she finished with a rousing speech about whether she "looked like a Labour leader" I can't have been the only person to have been surprised at the vociferous applause she received.

Sadly she's hardly got any MPs backing her so she can't win, after all what would a leadership contest be if it wasn't stacked massively against individual members having a proper say? I'll give her this though - she was much stronger than I'd expected and I would not be surprised if she did well in the membership part of the ballot.

If you want to know what happened in the Mayoral half check out Richard Osley's tweeting.

Good luck Ken

Many Londoners, at least members of certain unions and the Labour Party, will be receiving their ballot papers for Labour's Mayoral selection today. I'd just like to take this opportunity to wish Mr Livingstone the best of luck as I'm looking forward to voting for him (second preference) in 2012.

An identikit politician like Oona King simply doesn't have what it takes to beat the Conservatives, and although she may well keep the loyal Labour vote no Mayoral election has ever been won on first preferences alone. Labour needs second preferences to win and Oona is just too uninspiring and, if I'm honest, shifty to win them in sufficient numbers.

I wouldn't vote for her and she'd stand a cat in hell's chance of getting an official Green Party endorsement the way Ken did in 2008.

In her campaign video (produced by the excellent David Schneider) she claims to have a solid record of political achievements, but you just can't compare Ken's uniquely radical record over the last three decades to Oona's neoliberal pottering about.

Ken is probably this country's most successful politician alive today and even when he lost the Mayoralty he did it with more votes and second preferences than he'd ever had before - he lost because the Conservatives hoovered up vast amounts of the Lib Dem vote after they ran a terrible candidate with a useless campaign.

If you care about diversity in politics, if you care about London having a left of centre Mayor and if you care about London's green policies - I'd ask you to consider selecting for Ken.

h/t Ken's video via Socialist Unity. Oona's via Liberal Conspiracy.

Diane's alright, but...

So today they've sent out the ballot papers for the Labour Party leadership fight. It looks like Vote Match is telling me I'm a strong Abbott supporter, but truth be told none of them get me very excited.

It's absolutely true that I share a number of political positions with Abbott, and she's likable enough, but I just don't think she'd be a very good leader.

When it comes to war, privatisation, racist immigration policy or a refusal to take the environment seriously the Labour Party is in the grip of the right, and there's no immediate prospect of that changing any time soon.

Of course there are some Labour politicians I respect a great deal, admire even, but right now all the leadership contest has drawn out is how far Labour has to go before it seriously reassesses where it's going. Nor does there seem to be any significant grassroots revival taking place.

Even moderate figures like Harriet Harman or Jon Crudas could have substantially improved this contest and given members an opportunity to vote for someone who can articulate left of centre politics. That said they'd have been pretty thin gruel for those with firmer politics or more principled ways of doing things.

It's going to be a long road back to power for Labour I think, and I have my doubts that they'll be a meaningful break with neo-liberalism in the meantime. If it's worth anything if I had a vote it would be Diane Abbott 1 and Ed Miliband 2 but I'd cast that vote with a weary sigh. (h/t Iain Dale for Vote Match)

Is Cameron a loud mouth?

David Cameron is in trouble with the former Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, for being direct and clear in his speeches about foreign affairs.

First Cameron called Gaza an "open prison" and then he criticised elements of the Pakistan security services for aiding the UK's enemies in Afghanistan. Miliband described the PM as a "loud mouth" although he made no comment on the content of Cameron's speeches.

We know Miliband would never do such a thing. After all, his tour of duty was not known for either criticising the actions of the Israeli government, no matter how revolting, nor taking an open and honest stance on the Afghan situation - we didn't even need the recent leaks to know that.

Miliband's outburst attacking Cameron is in stark contrast to his mumbled and embarrassed comments during Israel's bombardment of Gaza that had to be wrung out of him, so reluctant was he to use the UK's clout for good.

During the Blair years the fact that business was always done behind closed doors was always made a virtue of so you'd see Blair claiming he was "influencing" Bush behind the scenes as the war machine pushed ever onwards unabated.

Various diplomats have rushed to Cameron's defence saying that direct language can be completely appropriate on the international stage, it's just we haven't seen much plain speaking for the last thirteen years. I think I agree.

For me a bit of honest speaking is just what we need to clear the air after years of manipulation and distrust. A large number of countries do not see the UK as an honest broker and that is unlikely to change if we continue with a Miliband style policy of half-truths, mumbling and blood.

Interview: AVPS's Phil on being a new Labour recruit

I'm becoming increasingly interested in Labour's membership surge in the wake of the new coalition government. On the spur of the moment I decided to ask Phil, long-time lefty from the blindingly delightful AVPS blog, a few questions on how he's finding his new home - Stoke Labour Party.

• Do you feel there's space for you to make an individual contribution?

It depends what you mean by contribution. In terms of an activist contribution, then yes. Our CLP has effectively been run down over a period of years and has recently undergone a split. So there is plenty of space for people with an activist conception of politics to get stuck in.

If by contribution you mean being listened to and taken seriously by other, longer standing members then the answer to that is yes as well. I haven't hidden my politics from anyone. People know until recently I was active with the Socialist Party, and some have proven curious about how we organised things there and how that experience can be applied here.

To be honest, any half decent ward branch and CLP should be able to accommodate the experience and energies of those who cut their teeth in the far left and/or other radical political traditions.

• Do you feel there's space to influence your local branch from the left?

Yes, and in a modest way I already have done. The bottom line for any socialist not involved in one of 57 varieties of party-building is to spread socialist politics the best they can and encourage "normal workers" to get involved in political activity.

At our annual general meeting just over a month ago I was elected the CLP's political education officer. Some might see this as an opportunity to lecture the membership on their hobby horses once a month, but I don't. I outline what I think can be done in the role here.

The first thing I did as PEO was to organise a monthly political discussion in my ward branch on a topic of members' choice (readers familiar with the SP and SWP will know the deal). The first discussion? 'Is socialism out of date?' In addition to this, I put together a monthly report every CLP member gets to see. This is an opportunity to plug a few hobby horses and introduce members to decent political writing they may have otherwise missed. But I am balanced and draw attention to pieces from all wings of the labour movement.

I've also been elected the trade union liaison officer. I intend to use this position to encourage the sizable number of local affiliated union branches to send representatives to our meetings and encourage them to become more involved in the political process. While it is true the upper echelons of the party have treated unions with barely-concealed contempt since Blair captured the leadership in 1994, the failure of unions to not properly use the thousands of links they have with party organisations did nothing to strengthen their hand when it came to confrontations with the previous government and local authorities. A politicised trade union movement active inside the party it founded is the best way of insuring the sorts of neoliberal excesses we saw in the Blair/Brown years are avoided in future.

• Is there an active membership to engage with?

Yes, there is. In the SP you had the inactive members, the comrades who'd infrequently attend meetings, and those who would attend and do the bulk of the work. There's a similar pattern to local Labour membership, though as you would expect the numbers are bigger for all three categories. My CLP's new executive has an activist conception of politics and are looking at ways of encouraging the bulk of the membership to become more involved in party work. Part of the PEO role is making this point of view part of the CLP's common sense too.

During the election we spoke to people who'd never been canvassed by Labour activists before, despite Stoke Central being a stronghold since the year dot. That, frankly, is a scandalous situation and one we're still in the process of rectifying.

• Do you feel membership is affecting your own political positions?

No I don't. But I cannot give a solid guarantee this will always be the case.

It's a basic truism of Marxism that social being conditions consciousness. You only have to look at the numerous examples of militants who've entered Labour and come out the other end with knighthoods and gongs to prove this. It wasn't because they lacked sufficient will power or didn't have enough Bolshevik iron in their souls: it was years of commitment to electoral politics around ever narrower definitions of 'what is possible' that did the job.

Now I'm in the Labour Party and know I will be constantly exposed to the same processes I cannot say, hand on heart, it will have no effect on me. But at least in my case there are things about my political activity that can shield me from this.

First there is my existing politics - 17 years of professing Marxist views in circumstances one could hardly describe as "germane" do not pass quickly. Second, among my closest comrades are a group of ex-SP'ers who've come to similar conclusions about Labour as I have. Third, I write left wing political stuff on an (almost) daily basis and mainly read the blogs of like-minded folk. Fourth, I do work outside the Labour party too. And lastly, I am conscious of the "moderating" influence Labour politics has had on others and could have on me.

I'd like to thank Phil for his interesting and honest responses.

Back at you Mr Mayor

To think I voted for Sir Steve Bullock second preference at this year's Lewisham Mayoral election. Anyway, he's repaid my act of charity by branding protesters against the cuts "fucking idiots" and demanded that they "get real" - all while he was chairing a cabinet meeting. That's multi-tasking for you.

So much for Labour being the anti-cuts party. In Lewisham we're blessed with the fact that those fighting the cuts find themselves opposed to both the Liberal-Tory national coalition and the Labour council who were announcing closures before we even knew who the national government was.

Last night around one hundred protesters lobbied the council over their plans to, among other things, close five local libraries, shut down nurseries and reduce council staff. For an area where unemployment is on the rise the loss of local services and laying off workers seems completely the wrong way to go.

Hangbitch who attended the protest says that "we all know that these immediate economies are false economies. Bullock’s huge list targets people we (literally) can’t afford to target."

Meanwhile what does Sir Steve have to say about his disrespect for those who want decent public services and had hoped that this Labour council would fight to keep every job? “I think I may have left the mic on while I was making an aside.”

I'm assuming "aside" is a euphemism that we'll all be taking up soon in Lewisham. I'm pretty sure they'll be plenty of "asides" made about Sir Steve's attitude in the coming months as the council prepares the redundancy notices.

Tweet of the day

Spotted this one earlier which kind of summed it up for me.

mrmarksteel Great that Diane Abbott's in leadership contest for variety - black, female and left-wing. If only she wasn't also fucking hopeless.

It's going to be a long old Labour leadership contest, with the winner decided at the end of September, so my advice is.... don't get too excited too soon. It's a marathon not a sprint.

King Livingstone

Good to see that Diane Abbott is on the ballot paper for Labour leader after a number of MPs who wont be voting for her backed her candidacy, in order to ensure that the contest was not simply between white men in suits. They may well get a shock if she does well though, but tough.

However, while the hoo ha continues about whether someone left of the center gets to lose the leadership to the Miliband franchise there is a far more important selection taking place inside of Labour. Namely, who is their best shot at winning the London Mayoralty where, in contrast to the national picture, it is the left who are ensconced in the arms of the establishment and the right who are the plucky outsiders raring to put some 'fresh ideas'.


As things stand right now it's going to be a Oona King vs Ken Livingstone stand-off with the winner to be decided at the Labour caber tossing contest late September. I'm interested not just because I'm a nosy beggar, but also because a) I live in London and so I'm curious as to who hopes to rule over me and b) we get a second preference in the Mayorals which, last time round, the Green Party officially recommended using for the Labour candidate.

This was the first time that the Greens had made a public recommendation on the second preference vote (you can see some of the joint leaflets in this campaign pic from 2008) and, while I know from first hand experience it made some sort of difference, it's not something that we gave away easily.

If Labour select Ken I'm confident we'll repeat that happy experience, but if they select some bomb loving politician-for-the-sake-of-it then I doubt London Greens would be shy about publicly critiquing the lack of progressive credentials in Labour candidate and we may well have a less supportive stance.

The two hopefuls are like chalk and cheese in many ways. King spent her time in Parliament as an ultra-loyal speak your policy machine while Livingstone has been a thorn in Labour's side for decades.

King has always been eminently ignorable and defeatable while Livingstone is a formidable customer, who walks the walk and is able to defeat real opponents both internal and external. He took on all comers, including Labour's Frank Dobson, to win the Mayoralty in the first place. His medal cabinet is unique in British politics, King on the other hand is "fresh" and essentially untested.

Labour MP David Lammy is backing Ken saying that "Above all, we need a political heavyweight. In 2012 the euphoria of the Olympics may well be tempered by the harsh realities of everyday life."

GMB union leader Paul Kenny is backing Ken saying “I am totally confident that with Ken elected as London Mayor in 2012 our transport, social housing and employment needs will once again receive the attention that London demands.”

Alternatively Oona says of her candidacy that "We can’t kid ourselves that we can beat Boris Johnson by using the same rhetoric or policy platform that failed last time. We need fresh new ideas. We need an honest conversation with London based on our values and aspirations – that’s what this site and my candidacy is about."

It's nice to hear she's going to single-handedly overturn Labour's entire policy platform, but her website gives little indication of in what way she intends to this. Does she mean she's going to reverse policy on transport and the congestion charge? Will she issue all Brazilians with bullet proof vests on the tube? What?

You see, for me, this selling point of freshness (and its related diversity) just doesn't work. Oona's politics aren't fresh at all. In the context of British politics it's always been Ken who has brought forward strong, new ideas and he continues to explore new ways of concretely improving London. Fresh and empty are not synonymous with each other.

Londoners like outsiders and, in general, I think they like the way Ken clearly loves the city. He's given his heart and soul to it for forty years or more. Where's Oona been in the five years she was out of Parliament? She just doesn't have the political grit required for the job as far as I can see and I suspect most people will see her candidacy as fuelled by personal ambition in a way quite different from Ken's ambitions that have always been tied to taking the hard road in politics.

The final argument against Ken is that he lost the last election because Londoners were 'sick off him' and that he was 'rejected' by London, but the facts tell a very different story. Year on year more Londoners voted for Ken at each successive election, despite the fact that 2008 saw Labour's vote slump across the rest of the country - something that was astounding feat for a Labour candidate.


Ken didn't lose the election Boris Johnson won it, taking Steven Norris' 28% in 2004 and turning it into a whopping 42% of the vote. Anyone who's going to overturn that level of support, particularly when Boris has not horrified most voters in the way he has us lefty politicos has got to have a proven track record of winning hard battles. Oona does not have that.

It's not that the Greens agree with Ken all the time, far from it, but he's a serious politician who we can work with on friendly terms and with whom we genuinely do share a great deal of political ground. The same cannot be said for King whose track record of coalition building does not extend beyond the Iraq invasion.

It's good that there's a choice and quite rightly I don't get a vote in Labour's selection process, but I will get a say in whether the Greens recommend a second preference for Labour in 2012 and that rests entirely on who they pick as their candidate.