Sunday 6 December 2009

The end of the Labour Party

The Sunday Times (6th December) published a dispiriting story that I think sums up the New Labour Party and the real end of the Labour Party that I once proudly belonged to for almost 40 years.
Paddy Tipping, the Labour MP for Sherwood in Nottinghamshire is stepping down at the next election.
The Party has decided that it will be an All Women Shortlist and it would appear that the front runner is Emille Oldknow,the Regional Director for the East Midlands.
The gist of the story is that another local woman is withdrawing from the selection process because of a series of dirty tricks originating from the Regional Office.

Oldknow is well known in Northampton South, almost singlehanded she and another numpty,Matt Forde(an adolescent organiser now dispatched ro work for the Mayor of somewhere) destroyed the party in this constituency.

She is simply a hack in the worst 'jobsworth' tradition.There was a time many years ago when the Party employed organisers who were competent at organising ,often a bit obsessed by the rulebook,but flexible enough to understand that the party was made up of volunteers who needed support not instructions.
Go to Labour Home and pump in Northampton South and you can read the whole awful saga of the destruction of a constituency party by the sheer uselessness and incompetence of the Regional Office.
Since a few of us were expelled two years ago we have demanded an open and public inquiry,and we would have settled for the outcome.
Instead of which they have continued to attack the CLP, suspended it, and are currently holding a series of show trials to expel the few remaining activists the party has left.
Oldknow is of course assured of a safe Labour seat, she has what is left of the party machine behind her(her boyfriend works directly for Gordon Brown) and after the xperiences in Northampton South,there can be little doubt that dirty tricks are going on to secure her the nomination.

But then only a few months ago attempts were made to parachute Georgia Gould into a Labour held seat, and as the election gets closer the Inner party clique who now run New Labour will ensure that all the favoured sons and daughters will find what they hope to be safe berths in Westminster.
Can this be true? Well in the same Sunday Times piece it indicated that Oldknow's boyfriend is also likely to find a nearby'safe' seat!
Years ago there used to be seats that appeared to be in the 'gift'of certain powerful unions.Now it would seem that such seats are the exclusive gift of what Chairman Mao used to call"the Top Party People in Authority taking the Capitalist Road'
Except our modern capitalist roaders are insignificant political pigmies interested only in being career politicians-they probably don't really care which party!