Peter Kenyon

Angela Eagle sets out her stall

Congratulations to Angela Eagle on having her name put forward by Labour Leader Ed Miliband to replace Peter Hain as chair of the National Policy Forum.

I worked with her on the LabOUR Commission in 2006/07. This is her Foreword to the Commission's Interim Report - Renewal a two-way process for the 21st century, published in 2007:

Foreword – Angela Eagle MP

Labour has to renew its financial, organisational and political vigour to secure a fourth term in Government . The loss of four million votes and half of our membership since 1997 sounds the warning bells clearly enough. Political culture is changing and we must respond. The era of Labour as an over centralised ‘command party’ - see Figure 1 opposite - which replaced the chaos of the 1980s with a winning formula, has now become counter-productive. It has bred cynicism and stifled activism. The urgent question now is: What should replace it? The forthcoming Leader/Deputy Leader elections will help to define this new era for our Party. The LabOUR Commission’s Interim recommendations presented here are based onthe findings of the first representative study of Labour Party members’ views since Labour’s landslide victory in 1997. Both lapsed and current members were contacted. A crucial lesson from our research is that Labour in Government has not trusted Party members enough. Our research findings show that the Labour Party has changed. Labour Party members are pragmatic and they want Labour to be in Government. They understand how important it is to win. In return, they expect to be trusted to help shape policies to win support from the communities Labour seeks to serve.This Interim Report suggests a model of Party organisation which will serve Labour well in the future. As a Party seeking to empower all sections of our society, we know we cannot rely on the kind of mercenary multi-millionaire donors now currently filling Tory party coffers. Labour will always need its activists who go door knocking whatever the weather. Members, both individuals and those from our affiliated organisations, are Labour's most precious resource. Our interim recommendations should be seen against the background of rising and wasteful election spending on billboard advertising, and remote professional canvassing. That is why all year round election spending limits are essential. This would create a level playing field between the main political parties for the first time in British political history.As a member of the Labour Party’s National Executive Committee, I know we have it within our power to reinvigorate Labour and remake our Party structures with members at the centre and accountability re-established. People join the Labour Party to change the world and make our society a better place for us all to live in. I hope our Interim Report will provide fresh hope to Labour Party members throughout Britain. Our recommendations show how renewal is possible, and that under new leadership it must be achieved by a genuine dialogue.

May 2007

The full report is available here.

Labour, Ken Livingstone and elected mayors: abolish....

For the avoidance of confusion, It's elected mayors, I'm after. Ken, or his proxies, at Labour Party Head Office, have just sent an eMail to CLP secretaries extending thanks to all involved in the campaign just ended. There are lessons to be learned. 

Why is Labour tolerating elected mayors in the first place?

Why is it allowing elected Labour representatives in public governmental office more than two terms?

I replied to Ken:

I can only speak in a personal capacity:

Labour should legislate to end all Mayoral positions

You sd hv called it a day after two terms.

The greatest service you can do your party is promote democratic socialism for the 21st century.

First test: speak out for open, transparent policy making and against the Peter (Black Hole) Hain method of consultation. 

Yours in hope of 'sinners' repenting.

 

Peter (Black Hole) Hain sets out Partnership into Power timetable

Patrick Moore's 700th Sky at Night is being (re)screened on BBC Four. All that talk of black holes couldn't help reminding me of Peter Hain MP, Chair of the National Policy Forum. Earlier today I , along with every other e-literate Labour Party member, received an invitation from the man himself. Peter, that is, not Patrick. Patrick is interested in informing, enlightening and enthusing. I'm not convinced we can say the same about Peter.

Peter's eMail asserts:

...Labour is changing to ensure that we can deliver fairness, even in tough times, by making different choices and tackling the vested interests that hold Britain back. The documents look at some key areas where Labour is setting out a new approach – and we want to hear your views.

Your ideas and comments will feed into our policy making process, Partnership into Power, helping to shape our manifesto for the next election. Everything we hear will shape discussions in our policy commissions and at a summer meeting of the National Policy Forum – before the documents go to Annual Conference..... 

Peter is offering exactly the same format for responding that has left members with no confidence in Partnership in(to) Power, and me personally with no confidence in Peter Hain.

One clue is in the format. We submit, but can't see any other submission, can't enter into debate, and consequently can't be sure that what emerges from the consultation process bears any relationship to the submissions.

Secondly, consider the timetable:

We’d like as many submissions as possible by Friday 8 June. Submissions which reach us by this date will help to inform discussions at the National Policy Forum meeting on 16-17 June. Submissions received after this date will still be considered – with those received by the end of June informing policy commission when documents are redrafted ahead of Annual Conference.

My own CLP's branches that are meeting monthly have already either met or issued agendas in the May cycle. The deadline is before any branch will meet in June. In short, it is impossible at such short notice to organise any meaningful discussion across the range of policy issues set out in the six policy consultation documents issued tonight, in the time allowed by Peter Hain. 

I have already called for the NEC to propose and vote for a motion of confidence in Peter here. (Ditto NEC constituency section wannabes.) In the light of his letter to e-literate members, do you need any further convincing? 

 

Has Len Duvall offered to resign as GLA Labour Group leader, if not, why not?

While the king/queen makers of London politics go about buffing up their egos talent spotting for 2016, there is a not insignificant question about the Leadership of the Greater London Assembly Labour Party group.

Jon Worth, writing on Labour List earlier today states: Labour needs a new leader for London to take the attack to Boris http://bit.ly/J96a7K

I replied:

You pose a highly pertinent question. 

But unless I am mistaken (a frequent occurrence, but, hey) there will be an election for leader of the GLA Labour Group? Maybe it has already taken place? If that election has not been framed in the context of who best to hold the Tory mayor to account and position Labour to win in 2016 (unless Labour is minded to abolish elected mayors) then the London Labour Party board needs to get busy.

The leadership you seek can only come from among our 12 Labour representatives elected last Thursday. You cite three potential candidates, Len Duvall, Val Shawcross, and Jennette Arnold. Maybe there are others from among the new intake.

Effectively governance of the process is not helped by the chair of the London Labour Party board being none other than Len Duvall. Such blatant conflicts of interest have to legislated out of order by Conference. In the meantime a pragmatic view will have to prevail. Len must stand down as GLA Labour Group leader and allow a contested election to take place.

I hope Len does the decent thing and steps down as Group Leader, declares a conflict of interest as Chair of the London Labour Party board, and allows a proper contest to take place.

Gloves off, time for a no confidence vote in Peter Hain

Why Peter Hain?

For a fuller explanation, please refer to my article, Labour - a lost cause?  in the latest edition of Chartist - the bimonthly for democratic socialism. The piece was written two weeks before the May elections, and I admit I under-estimated the capacity of the Scottish Labour Party to grasp victory from the jaws of defeat. But that should not detract from the thrust of my thesis about the danger to Labour of professional politicians, whom Peter Hain epitomises.

I concluded:  

While the Labour Party continues to be dominated by the salaried and aspiring political class, its ability to 'reconnect' will be compromised... I'll be voting for any NEC or NPF candidate willing to move an NEC vote of no confidence against Peter Hain, and/or run a campaign to rebuild paid membership electoral ward by electoral ward, and give members an effective say in policy making.

With the benefit of hindsight, I should have gone back to his pamphlet, The Future Party, published by the trade union funded think-tank Catalyst in 2004, and done a proper demolition job.

For a more recent account of Peter's Refounding success, check out his interview last month in The Australian:  Brotherly advice: reform or die 

Last year, Hain authored a 10,000 word report, Refounding Labour, for Labour leader Ed Miliband that canvassed systemic reforms to revitalise the party in a changing political world.

When you have finished spluttering into your cup of Horlicks, you will be aware that the Labour Party is far too polite to allow a motion of no confidence in any of the 'self-select'. But if anyone is any doubt about whether Peter Hain should go or not check out the next set of Partnership in Power policy documents and arrangements for the National Policy Forum in Birmingham in June.

Will Ed's donation cap rate as highly as Baldrick's cunning plan?

Desultory efforts on my part to discover the rationale for the call by Labour Party leader Ed Miliband on the AM Show on Sunday 15 April 2012 for a £5,000 cap on donations to UK political parties has left me wondering.

Should we blame Baldrick?

Update promised as soon as I get some information worth reporting.

Ed Goes to Bradford

There is one person I was hoping to hear was included in list of people Labour Leader Ed Miliband was going to listen to in Bradford, following his party's humiliation in the Bradford West by-election.

This report:  Ed Miliband 'listens and learns' in Bradford after poll defeat | Politics | The Guardian http://bit.ly/HAnXCD makes no reference to him.

His name is Naweed Hussain. He was the former MP, Marsha Singh's campaign organiser and agent, who became George Galloway's de facto agent. There is an excellent account of his role in Prospect magazine here. The author David Goodhart sums up his role:

Even more than George Galloway, a young man called Naweed Hussain is the key to the Bradford West by-election upset.

So, Ed: Did you meet him? If not, why not? Too hot to handle?

 

Has Ed thought through the human/financial costs of year-round campaigning?

Labour Leader Ed Miliband gave a speech earlier today in Derby in which he set out an ambition for year-round campaigning on your street.

But I know we can do more. Not just campaigning at these elections for your vote. But also campaigning year round for change on your street, in your neighbourhood.

This is a fine sentiment, but has he done his sums? Is year round campaigning actually what the Labour Party should be aiming to do? Or is that just part of a community political process? Don't get me wrong, I don't want to discourage this line of thinking. I just want the resource implications acknowledged and members encouraged to think and plan in those terms. Otherwise, Ed, if I may address you personally, you risk widening the gulf between yourself, our party and the electorate. People understand time and money, they have to wrestle with completing demands day-in, day-out.

BTW as I no longer have any input into the policy prescriptions you set out, why should I bother to campaign? Time for a return to resolution-based debate, providing the resolution is the result of local collective deliberation and not a personal agenda? Whatever, you are going to have to be bold to break the current political mould.

 

No thanks from Labour's GS Iain McNicol as Refounding Labour cuts bite

As previously reported the Labour Party Head Office is moving to Brewer's Green, earlier today I learned Friday is the day. As if further evidence of couldn't organise a piss-up in a brewery were needed, I also received an eMail from General Secetary, Iain McNicol setting out changes to my constituency labour party (CLP) income. The proportion of membership subscriptions being remitted to local parties is being slashed in some instances from one-third to nearly one-thirtieth. 

The changes arise from the notorious top down stitchup agreed at last year's party conference mislabelled Refounding Labour. They mask a lamentable and wholly avoidable failure on the part of the leadership and the National Executive Committee to rethink the way the Labour Party pays its way as a mainstream political party. Instead we have more hankering after state-funding (see Party funding rules face overhaul as talks continue http://bit.ly/Hx4jw0) , and a clampdown on local parties' finances to fill the holes in Head Office accounts. To add insult to injury, there was not a word of thanks, appreciation or recognition of any effort expended by members administering the party on the ground.

I had expected better when Iain was elected. Oh, BTW the citation should have been 'Dear Comrade', not 'Dear friend'. 

 

An alternative to state funding - electoral ward political party branch budgeting

This is as stoggy as a hot cross bun. Read no further. Debate about how political parties should be funded has been rekindled by yet another scandal. The latest involves cash for access and co-treasurer of the Conservative Party, Peter Cruddas, who promptly resigned. Attempts by Labour to score political points are unlikely to impress the vast majority of the electorate. Most of the debate focuses on the motives of donors and the base practices of party fund-raisers. Few if any commentators, let alone voters, give a moment's thought to when, where and how often political parties need money.

Democratic societies need political parties. They are generally the only institutions capable of forming governing bodies at whatever level - national, regional or local government. (There are some worrying departures in the European Union following the Eurozone crisis, but that should not detract from the norm.) If you want power, or a handle on power, or to enable others to exercise power on your behalf, then joining a political party is the way to go. There was a time in the UK when money played a direct part in securing a seat in Parliament. The notorious "Spendthrift election" came in Northamptonshire in 1768, when three earls spent over ₤100,000 each to win a seat. These blessed isles saw the light about politics with the introduction of rules to limit spending on elections at a local ward/constituency level. Though it took over 200 years to introduce limits on national spending in General Elections. Such rules are now bundled with a regulatory body, the Electoral Commission (EC), into law. People at the centre of party politics came to see the legislation enact by Labour in 2000 as the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act as a curse. That includes Labour. It is worth dwelling for a moment on why. The EC took a rather silly view about the role of treasurers in political parties, placing what seemed to be overly onerous requirements even on constituencies accounts. The absence of anyone with any experience of active party membership on the Commission itself didn't help. But it did have some sound ideas, which really irked the professional political class. In its requirements for annual reporting by registered political parties, the EC suggested membership should be included in the annual Statement of Accounts. As one if its first decisions, the Commission embarked on an Inquiry into the funding of political parties. In its recommendations published in December 2004, the EC concluded there was no case for state-funding, but that there were issues for political parties concerning membership and small donations. Given the presumptions of the political class, and that includes Labour's upper echelons, the EC recommendatons were buried. The then Leader of the House of Commons Peter Hain failed to make parliamentary time available. Yes, the same Peter Hain who presided over the bungled exercise to Refound Labour last year, adn who is still in an influential party position as chair of the National Policy Forum.

This is unfinished business. Labour doesn't have to wait for the other political parties. It has an opportunity to reconnect with its core vote and build the Party on the Ground.

This is not a hopeless cause, or one lacking possible traction either with the new general secretary or members of the parliamentary labour party. There is a strong case for looking at the issue of political party funding through the other end of the telescope. You just have to ask: how many Labour members of parliament elected in 2010 won their seats thanks to above average levels of local campaigning activity undertaken by volunteers, with or without professional organisational support? In which seats did Labour win a higher percentage of the vote than the national average? 

What the 2010 general election campaign highighted for Labour were different models of local political organisation -  an often cited example was Birmingham, Edgbaston where the sitting MP Gisela Stuart secured re-election with a slightly lower share of the vote and a modest 1.3% swing to Conservative from Labour. This compared with a national swing against Labour of 6.2%. Much more deserving of study is the result in Oxford East where sitting MP Andrew Smith was relected with a 6.5% increased share of the vote and a swing TO Labour of 4.2%. Whereas Stuart's victory was MP/organiser campaign led, Smith's was underpinned by an active local party and a local councillor-base/Labour group that had seen off the Liberal Demcrats on the city council. This is not an exact science. But it is a pointer to the future.

Layering community activity, and the way it is organised and accounted for is critical to rebuilding the Party on the Ground, winning future elections and burying the threat to our democratic socialist party from the Tories and the Liberal Democrats. A possible place to start is using the national agreed limits to start building election-cycle budgets and fundraising strategies to match political goals overtime. After the May elections, of course. Someone in your CLP will be filling in the forms for election expenses. Those limits matter, both for accounting and future budgeting. Think about it.