The nominations phase of the CLP section of Labour’s NEC elections has ended and Labour Party members will soon be invited to vote to fill the nine allotted places. We should state from the outset that although we think the six candidates of the Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance, now re-named the Grassroots Voice (GV), are our first six choices, we stand by our earlier view that socialists should fight for all nine places.
Altogether, there were nearly 4,000 nominations, as most CLPs nominating put forward a long list of candidates. Although these are only nominations and not votes, there are still important points that we should still note. The first is that while there has been a marked shift to the right at the top of the Party, the nominations show that there is still a considerable base for the left within the rank and file. The Labour Party membership, contrary to what the faint-hearts and leavers have said, is far from a lost cause.
Left has ‘out-nominated’ the right
The highest individual number of nominations was for Laura Pidcock, former MP for Durham North, and one of Labour’s most consistent and outspoken lefts and a strong supporter of Corbyn. She was followed by Ann Black of ‘Open Labour’ who, despite voting with the right wing on most issues, has established a personal reputation for at least regularly sending reports of NEC meetings to constituency Labour Parties around the country – something most lefts don’t bother doing. But after these two, the next five highest were all nominees of Grassroots Voice.
In fact, the GV slate took 42 per cent of all the nominations. The Labour Left Alliance (LLA) took 5 per cent and the Tribune Group, which is at best ‘soft left’ but presents an image, as per its website, of being “committed to reviving this great tradition on the British left”, took a further 4 per cent. That means that groups that define themselves as ‘left’ took 51 per cent of all the nominations. The right-wing slate – and, of course, the right never describes itself as such – took only 24 per cent of the votes. Luke Akehurst, described as a “great guy” by the senior Political Officer of the Israeli embassy in the Al Jazeera tapes, and a darling of the media and the right, came in tenth place, with nearly a hundred fewer nominations than the lowest-placed GV candidate.
After the GV six votes, there was a notable success for Roger Silverman, with 65 nominations, showing, as an aside, the lingering support for the old Militant Tendency in the Party, as well as three others on the LLA slate: Alec Price, Ekua Bayanu and Chaudhry Qamar Iqbal, all of whom got over 30 nominations.
An arrogant sense of ‘entitlement’
In deciding where votes should now be cast, an added complication is the fact that the nominees were given only 24 hours after the close of nominations to decide whether or not to withdraw. It looks like a deliberate ploy, (not justified by the logistics of the voting process) to prevent any serious weighing up of options over what is a very crowded field. It will mean that some candidates who now decide they want to withdraw will need to issue statements to that effect, but that their names may still appear on the official ballot. That can’t be helped, however.
In mid-October the voting begins. Because the right-wing dominated NEC has also introduced a new Single Transferable Vote system, there is consternation on the left about how best to vote tactically. The Grassroots Voice approach is simple: they believe all others on the left should stand down and that the left should vote for only six candidates. Even if they won six places for their candidates, it still means allowing the right to win the other three, consolidating their grip on the NEC.
It is undeniably true that the Labour left is split at the moment. It is like a rope that has huge potential tensile strength, but where the individual strands are becoming detached and frayed, making it far weaker overall. It has been suggested that the splits will lead, not to the left winning six seats out of nine, but as few as four or five. It is always the case that the left is more united in a period of advance and, conversely, more prone to splits in a period of retreat, such as we have now.
We made the point in our earlier editorial that we were opposed to the manner in which the then Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance decided their original slate. In a closed meeting, excluding important sections of the Labour left, notably the LLA, their slate of six was put forward as the only candidates that all the left should nominate, never mind that it potentially allowed the right wing to take the three remaining seats. This arrogant exclusivity has worked to a degree, as the number of nominations shows. Their candidates, including former MPs and NEC members, are better known and it shows in the nominations, but nevertheless, their haughty sense of entitlement has raised hackles on the left.
Grassroots Alliance are responsible for confusion
If there is division and confusion on the left of the Labour Party over who to support in the forthcoming vote, therefore, Grassroots Voice bear the main responsibility for it. At no stage to our knowledge have they put forward a platform of policies around which to build a left movement. On the contrary, their six candidates have cocooned themselves off from any ‘controversy’ by each having personal political ‘minders’ as a buffer between themselves and the outside world. Their collective spokesperson has even suggested that they should reach out to ‘Starmer supporters’ – in other words to the right – to garner votes.
If Grassroots Voice are serious about having a disciplined and united vote on the left of the party, they must take steps to make it happen. If they want other candidates to stand aside for their six, they must prove they are worthy of that honour and not just assume it. They should convene a meeting of all left candidates, to agree a common left platform around which Labour members can unite. That would have to include, as a minimum, full support for the policies of the 2019 Labour manifesto. It would have to include support for Open Selection. It would have to support the campaign in the NHS for a 15 per cent pay rise across the board. It would have to oppose the ongoing witch-hunt of Labour members on spurious grounds. Not least, the six should commit to pushing the Labour Party to campaign on these issues, whatever the parliamentary leadership are doing.
What is ‘left’ and what is not
If the GV is not prepared to do any of these things, they will be judged to have failed the cause of socialism in the Labour Party. It is, after all, a political issue, about what exactly ‘left’ is what it is not. It is not a matter of boosting the political profiles or careers of a group of individuals. One thing is certain, Grassroots Voice cannot pretend to be standing on the high moral ground, if they continue to adopt the mentality of the closed, smoke-filled room.
We must also add that the Labour Left Alliance is not covering itself with glory. To their credit, they organised nomination hustings and open meetings to allow Party members and LLA supporters to hear the view of candidates on the left, and their approaches to the GV were rebuffed. But having arrived at a slate and platform of their own, rather late in the day, they are now suggesting that their own slate of six be the first choices in the vote, and we disagree completely with that stance. It is an ultra-left view that will only add to the confusion on the left and potentially present seats to the right wing.
LLA policy is ultra-left
In our opinion, the LLA should ask their three lowest-placed candidates to withdraw and support only their three best-placed, and even then only as choices 7, 8 and 9, after the GV six. Two of their better-placed candidates, Roger Silverman and Alec Price, we supported in our original editorial because of their ‘For Socialism’ platform, and they have succeeded in raising genuine socialist ideas over the last six weeks in a way unmatched by the GV candidates or the other LLA names. But we nevertheless stand by our view that the LLA should support only their top three behind the GV six.
Vote for nine places in this order
In summary, therefore, we urge all readers and supporters of Left Horizons to work for a disciplined and united vote for nine candidates for the nine places on the NEC, but it is important that they vote for them in this order (which is the order of their nominations):
Laura Pidcock
Yasmine Dar
Gemma Bolton
Mish Rahman
Nadia Jama
Ann Henderson
Followed by:
Roger Silverman
Ekua Bayanu
Chaudhry Qamar Iqbal
All the indications are that this round of elections will consolidate the hold the right-wing already have on the NEC as a whole. But politics is a long game. Some of the best left candidates who fail to get elected this time, or who withdraw for the ‘greater good’, will live to fight another day and with a principled reputation.
Members will have the final word
It has largely been the Constituency Labour Parties that have led the charge to the left in the Corbyn era and the trades unions – with fifty per cent of conference vote – have held the ground for the right wing. But in the face of the relentless austerity of the Tories, an austerity now into its eleventh year, exacerbated by the unemployment and insecurities caused by coronavirus, it may well be the trade unions that are decisive in the next few years.
The ferment inside Unison, where the candidacy of Paul Holmes for general secretary is shaking up the union bureaucracy, is a harbinger of what will happen in all the big affiliated unions in the future. The tops of the Labour Party are moving right at a rate of knots, but they are moving against the tide of history and the membership of the party, including its affiliated membership, will have the last say. Within the left, it is time for discussion about principles, ideas and policies, not just lists of names.
October 2, 2020
