Compass (who claim to be giving direction to the democratic left) are conducting a survey on how to transform the Labour Party after the General Election. They state that - "Since 1997 Labour has lost over half its members. Win, lose or draw it is becoming very clear that after the general election the Party will need to think about how it renews and transforms itself in the months and years ahead......To kick things off and to get your direct input we've devised a short 10 min questionnaire which we're encouraging Labour activists, members, supporters and stakeholders to take part in."It took me much longer then 10 minutes to prepare my submission. But excluding the survey's 35 tick-boxes (which is an approach I criticise as being a means of obtaining the answers they are looking for),...

hat tip to Old Holdborn for this list of Labour scum sucking piggies. Lord Paul – £69,250 in donations to Labour, including £45,000 to Gordon Brown’s leadership campaign. A close friend of Gordon Brown and appointed to the Privy Council last summer.Lakshmi Mittal – £4.125 million in donations to Labour.Sir Ronald Cohen – £2.55 million in donations to Labour. Cohen was appointed chair of the Social Investment Taskforce, which was announced by the then Chancellor, Gordon Brown.Sir Christopher Ondaatje – £1.7 million in donations to Labour.Sir Gulam Noon – £532,826 in donations to Labour.William Bollinger – £510,725 in donations to Labour.Mahmoud Khayami – £985,000 in donations to Labour including £5,000 to Hazel Blears’ deputy leadership campaign.Dr David Potter...

Councillor David Sparks (Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council) has been elected as the new Leader Elect of the LGA Labour Group. He won in a contest with Councillor Peter Box (Wakefield Metropolitan District Council) and Councillor John Merry (Salford City Council). Sir Jeremy Beecham, Labour’s Leader in Local Government, said: “I am delighted to welcome Councillor David Sparks as Leader Elect of the LGA Labour Group. David will take over the leadership after I stand down at the LGA Conference in July. He has worked tirelessly and effectively over the years on behalf of local Labour in Dudley, in the West Midlands, and nationally as part of the Leadership team at the LGA. I know he has the experience and skills to lead the LGA Labour Group and will continue to fight the...

The latest quarter's funding of political parties has just been released:• Conservatives continue to broaden the base of support. In the last calendar year (2009), the Conservative Party received a total of 1,037 individual cash and in-kind donations. This is an increase of 40 per cent on the 742 cash and in-kind donations received in the previous calendar year (2008). • Conservatives have five times more individual support than Labour this year. The Conservative Party received over five times as many individual cash and in-kind donations as the Labour Party in 2009 (199 for Labour, 1,037 for the Conservative Party). • Labour Party still relies on a few big individual donors. In 2009, Labour received 199 cash and in-cash donations totalling £3,655,929.91 from individuals. Three...

In 2008, the good people of Irlam voted out their Labour Councillor, after it became clear that the Labour Party were no longer listening to local residents in Irlam, particularly over their disastrous proposals for a congestion charge. Our Conservative candidate saw his vote share rise considerably, and Labour plunged to third place, but the seat was won by Cllr Rick Houlton of the Community Action Party. I wonder what local people in Irlam would make, then, of last week’s Council budget meeting. Cllr Houlton stood on an anti-Labour ticket, and was swept into office on the back of disillusionment with Labour, so how is representing the people of Irlam when he votes to prop up the Labour administration on Salford City Council and supports their budget? It’s clear that voting...

Today Gordon Brown addressed the Labour Party Spring Conference. He tried to persuade people that Labour was the party for them but what I think he should have said is: “If you believe in a Government of Ministers that lie, then New Labour is for you. If you believe in falling public sector productivity, then New Labour is for you. If you believe in record public debt, then New Labour is for you. If you believe in higher taxes and a more complicated tax system, then New Labour is for you. If you believe in reckless spending and boom and bust, then New Labour is for you. If you believe in increased poverty and a widening gap between the rich and poor, then New Labour is for you. If you believe in sending our armed forces into combat without basic equipment, then New Labour is...

Party affiliation is a key organisational question for a Marxist, not one of sentiment. This is why, when New Labour published a sentimental campaign video hijacking half a century of social democracy, the reaction from many was disgust. We could not believe that New Labour saw itself as part of the pro-welfare state tradition even while dismantling it. Processes like this define the primary question for socialists: in or out of Labour? Social processes and Labour’s role There are two struggles worth speaking of and in both of them the Labour Party has played a negative role. The first is in the marketisation and privatisation of public services, essentially redistributing public funds into private coffers, with the added bonus of undermining workers’ rights. The second is in...

So - another one bites the dust. Cllr Sheik Thomson, who was Mayor of Haringey for Labour only the year before last, has resigned from the Labour party and become an independent. Last week Cllr Brian Haley resigned from Labour and joined the LibDems. Just before that, Labour Cllr Alan Dobbie resigned from Labour to become a Tory. They are dropping like flies. With votes now on the casting vote of the Mayor - that would explain why Labour suddenly cancelled the budget meeting that was set for next Monday. Roll on the local elections of May 6!...

I’m sure there's some people out there who are genuinely interested in who sits on certain committees in the Assembly. So for that silent majority here’s a list of some changes to those committees.Legislation Committee No.1 - Val Lloyd AM (Labour) in place of Huw Lewis AM (Labour).Legislation Committee No.2 - Rhodri Morgan AM (Labour) and Lynne Neagle AM (Labour) in place of Jeff Cuthbert AM (Labour) and Sandy Mewies AM (Labour).Legislation Committee No.3 - Joyce Watson AM (Labour) in place of Janice Gregory AM (Labour).Legislation Committee No.4 - Christine Chapman AM (Labour) and Brian Gibbons AM (Labour) in place of Lorraine Barrett AM (Labour) and Joyce Watson AM (Labour).Legislation Committee No.5 - Andrew Davies AM (Labour) in place of Lesley Griffiths AM (Labour).Subordinate...

Today is the first birthday of Labour List, many congratulations. I declare an interest as an early contributor and occasional commenter. The worst thing to happen to Labour List was the best thing. All the publicity about Derek Draper's appalling involvement with Damian McBride was the making of Labour List. Nothing became Labour List like Derek Draper's leaving. He had brought a lot of baggage which meant that many right wing bloggers took a very personal approach to attacking him and therefore Labour List. I think Labour List allows too many comments from people who aim to be solely destructive of threads, or to sidetrack posts. Tom Harris has written lucidly about how bloggers should respond to this. Freedom of speech of course, but Labour List should be a place for debate and too...

There’s an interesting article over at Socialist Unity, discussing the list of candidates being touted as the group to vote for – in thirteen of the six hundred odd constituencies anyway. It’s one of those things, one suspects, where a couple of lesser lights and nobodies want to get their name some publicity, so they come up with this list of rather self-evident lefties like Dave Nellist or John McDonnell and put it out there in blogoland. Stuff like this, where people are advocating support for individual candidates spread across multiple organisations, is a stop-gap measure obviously. It is unsustainable, especially in a context where parties like the Greens are going to run candidates against socialists. That’s not happening at parliamentary level, but it is...

This in from Peckham Liberal Democrats: Labour Councillor for Peckham Ward, Ola Oyewunmi has sensationally quit the party and applied to join the Liberal Democrats. In her letter of resignation she accused Labour of ‘running out of ideas, energy and time.’ Ola had been a member of the Labour party for more than 10 years and was elected as a councillor in 2006. Ola has worked with people with mental health problems for many years and it was a combination of Labour closing the emergency clinic at the Maudsley hospital and Nick Clegg’s commitment to a fairer deal for people with mental health problems that attracted her to the Lib Dems. She says, “You have to ask what is Labour for when there are more children growing up in poverty after 12 years of a Labour government than there...

Sometimes, when you’re tired, it’s nice to have someone do the legwork for you. So instead of that long post about the history of class and gender inequality within the NHS, here’s Reuben over at The Third Estate making a quote out of an imagined statement ( I think): ‘Back in the 1980s the Labour party lurched to the left and made the party unelectable. Ultimately it was the hardline Labour left who were responsible for 18 grim years of Tory rule.’ Ever since Blair’s landslide victory in 1997 this has been the orthodoxy, both within the Labour party and amongst political commentators in general.  It has been a stick with which to beat those who have demanded that Labour  behave in a more principled and more genuinely progressive fashion while in...

Labour Leader of the House, Carwyn Jones, this evening confirmed his intention to stand for the leadership of the Labour Group in the National Assembly for Wales with a promise ‘to be a leader for the whole of Wales’. The election to find a new Leader of Welsh Labour, is taking place following Rhodri Morgan’s announcement he is to stand down from the role in December. Speaking to members of his Bridgend constituency party, Mr Jones said: “Over the last few weeks I have spoken to most Welsh Labour Assembly Members and most Welsh Labour MPs. I am persuaded that I have strong support for my candidacy in both the National Assembly Labour Group and the Welsh Parliamentary Labour Party. “I am standing as a candidate who can build unity between the Assembly...

Talk of Labour's demise is premature – it might not be re-elected, but it's had a good conference and still has its supportersA year or so ago, I got into discussion with a Labour minister who knows his history. At one point, we found ourselves talking about George Dangerfield's 1935 classic (still in print, I believe, and still being discussed in relation to modern politics) The Strange Death of Liberal England, the book that tries to make sense of how the apparent Liberal hegemony in early 20th-century British politics collapsed into complete marginality in the aftermath of the first world war.Were we beginning to witness the Strange Death of Labour England, I wondered. Even then, it felt as though Labour was sliding inexorably downwards from its own hegemonic years under Tony Blair....

Whilst watching Newsnight last night (something I don't do regularly), I was amazed by the optimists in the Labour party. Margaret Beckett was among them, clearly everyone knows Labour is going through a tough time but why are people like Beckett so optimistic?If I was a Labour party member I wouldn't be optimistic at all, I would actually be looking at alternative leaders for the Labour party with fellow plotters. Everyone knows that they are people at the Labour party conference who are sitting around thinking of Brown alternatives, but when are they going to pounce and take Brown out.No change of leader by Labour so far, no bids to topple Brown so far, so how can Labour justify the empty conference...

As an ex-Labour voter I'm going to tell you why I think Labour will lose the next General Election. First of all we should discuss why people like me voted Labour in the last three elections. Why did I vote Labour? I'm afraid that I was greedy. Knowing that the country's finances were in good shape (thanks to the previous Tory government) I liked the idea of Labour's promise to through tons of money at our public services, I liked the idea of a minimum wage and I liked the sound of their promises to help out the less well off. That was 1997.By 2001 I was a little disillusioned with my decision to vote Labour at the previous Election. This was mainly because I felt that whilst they had indeed thrown money at our public services, they were not doing a good enough job at getting value for...

So Alastair Darling has added to the melee in advance of the Labour Party Conference. "The leadership has lost the will to live" he intones. Let me tell you Alastair so have many of the rank and file of the British public who have watched New Labour take over the Tory mantel as champions of Capitalism. Those in the fortunate position to do so still command the ability to negotiate enormous salaries and pensions. Those who don't lose jobs and pensions. One law for one group another for the rest. Who says the class system is dead as Blair used to claim as he saw to it which side he was going to be on. Clearly he is on the winning side while the rank and file of those that Labour once claimed to champion pay the bill. I moved out of the Labour Party, away from New Labour, because their...

Guido has a post about how Alastair Campbell might be joining team Labour for the general election campaign, and I think this is good news. I am not a fan of Brown, neither is I a fan of Cameron but I rather have a Labour government then a Tory one.So Campbell might come back but will he save the sinking ship that is Labour? Probably not, Labour in my opinion doesn’t need a change of campaign manager more a change of leader. A breath of fresh air from someone like Johnson or Miliband will save Labour, so please Labour, sack Brown at the party conference.With the Labour party conference starting this weekend I ask, will Labour get rid of Brown? I am not going to bet my socks on the odds that he will get kicked out (that's because I don't want to buy another pair), but the right thing to...

Conservatives - clearly, they are highlighting the extent of the debt problem and the fiscally irresponsible nature of the Government's expenditure profile since 2002 in order to be able to blame Labour for what is inevitably going to come. Assuming that the Conservatives win the next election, we will see how the strategy has worked after the election. If it has been successful, Labour will be blamed for the cuts in expenditure and for some of the difficult choices that will need to be made as a result.If the Conservatives don't win that election, we will see the Conservatives shouting, "Don't blame us, we told you so.", when the cuts in expenditure and tax rises bite after the next election.On balance, I think that the tactics will prove to have been beneficial in terms of the election...

A former Treasurer of the Tottenham Labour Party has defected to the Conservatives. This follows the recent defections of former Haringey Mayor Cllr Alan Dobbie (Noel Park) and Reading West Labour wannabe, Cllr Denise Headley (Edmonton Green) from Labour to the Conservatives. Michael Olajide, a qualified accountant, accused Haringey Labour of taking black and working-class voters for granted and sensationally accused them of using the Council as a ‘cash cow’ for their own personal advantages. Michael was Treasurer for Tottenham Labour in 2007, on their powerful Local Government Committee and a prominent member of the St. Ann’s branch. Giving his reasons for switching, Michael Olajide said: “The Tottenham Labour Party takes black and working-class voters for...

A contributor to the Labour Home blog has written about how he/she thinks Labour can win the next general election and I have to say I am amazed by the amount of hope the person still has in Labour. My favourite extract from the blog post is below:For Labourites, the message is clear – we stick behind Brown, we rememberthat the enemy is the other party not ourselves, and we continue to talk thingsup not down. Interesting what hope can do to a person, as a Lib Dem the only thing we can hope for is government and I think that's the same position Labour are in if they are thinking they can win the next election. My advice to Labour supporters will be totally opposite to what the extract above says... I think Labour need to ditch Brown as soon as possible, take Alan Johnson on as the leader...

The Independent reports:The size of the anti-Labour swing almost matches that achieved by the Tories last year in the Crewe and Nantwich by-election.Well, no. True, the 16.5% swing in Norwich compares to the 17.5% in Crewe, but those simple numbers conceal a big difference.In Crewe and Nantwich last May, the Labour vote fell by 18.2% and the Tory vote rose by 16.9% - clearly a large shift from one to the other. But in Norwich, while the Labour vote collapsed by 26.7%, the Tory vote rose by the far less impressive 6.3% - the anti-Labour vote splintered, with UKIP and the Greens each putting on more votes than did the Tories.But none of that detracts from the facts that Labour looks doomed, that the Tories look to be on for a comfortable general election win, and that congratulations are...

I just did a short piece on Radio 5 Live about the Norwich North by election, alongside the LibDem supporting Norfolk Blogger, Nich Starling. Nich said something which gave me real pause for thought. He believes the Labour vote is going to collapse so dramatically that Labour will come third. He didn't go so far as to predict a LibDem win (wise boy) but he is absolutely convinced that Labour is in for an absolute hammering.My own view is that the turnout is going to be dreadful and that many Labour voters will simply stay at home. But Nich possibly underestimates the solidity of the Labour vote in the City wards. It will be interesting to see what they do. If they do turn out to vote then Chloe Smith is in for a fight. If they don't, well, we'll see.But let's imagine that Nich is right....

Dear Claire,Further to our recent meeting, I am now writing today to inform you that with immediate effect that I have resigned from the Labour Party and therefore the Labour whip on Haringey Council.I will sit as a Conservative Councillor until the Council elections next May.For you and many others, this will come as a shock and no doubt many will be upset and angry at my decision.This has been no easy decision, but I believe that urgent change and a fresh start is needed, both for Haringey and Britain. We need at national level a Government that has a sense of purpose and will speak up for the ordinary person, something which Labour seems to have forgotten in recent years.As a I mentioned to you, I am proud of a lot of what Labour has achieved both locally and nationally, but the recent...

I have noticed that a lot of Labour candidates at the last local and European elections didn't push the message "Vote Labour" instead pushed the message "Vote Candidate X" and I think this is due to many factors. Labour candidates created "Vote Candidate X" posters and used them instead of Labour ones and some even customised rosettes to push the candidate forward instead of the Labour party and this is due to may factors.Everyone dislikes Labour, everyone you meet has either seen the weaknesses of Labour, think Cameron is attractive (clearly not the case) or have taken in by the Tory lies of how a Conservative government would make pigs fly. These issues are affecting the Labour vote and are leading to Labour candidates to ditch the party name in hope to get a personal vote and get...

A hung Parliament is something that I am predicting but the new poll has shown that will be case after I ran the results through UK Polling Reports Predictor. The results for the poll are:Conservatives 36% (-3)Labour 25% (+3)Lib Dems 19% (+1)And if you run these results through the UK Polling Report Calculator the results are:Conservatives 323 Seats (+125) Labour 238 Seats (-118) Lib Dems 57 Seats (-5)I think these results should be a wake up call for the Labour party and the Lib Dems, the Lib Dems need to make sure that we don't lose any seats to the Tories or Labour and we stay strong and the five it shows here are not lost and about 5 are gained.The Labour party need to see this as a wake up call and need to get out and get working hard and campaigning hard, Brown also needs to meet...

The Labour party want the by election for Norwich North to take place just before the Labour party Autumn Conference so if Labour have done badly this could be used against Brown. This is a good idea and I think it might just work for Labour.If Labour lose Norwich North and they are doing bad in the polls then clearly the aim of Conference goers will be to get rid of Brown by calling on him to go. Could Labour's grass root organise itself and get Brown out at the Autumn Conference if they lose Norwich North? I think they could if they work together using the Internet e.g. facebook and Labour blogs.I can't wait for the results of the Norwich North by election. I don't think many others can as well, what I can't wait for even more is a Labour party Conference shortly after Labour lose...

Salford Labour Party have decided to commit electoral suicide by allowing Hazel Blears to continue as their Parliamentary candidate, 31 to 13. I have to say I don't think this was wise of them.If you look at the last Parliamentary election in 2005 there was a very low turn out (42%) but the results look pretty handy for Labour. However, I don't think Blears will get as easy a ride now and she did then, particularly as the Labour government will be on their way out.Hazel Blears Labour 13,007 Laetitia Cash Conservative 3,440 Lisa Duffy UK Independence Party 1,091 Norman Owen Liberal Democrat...

I have always said that Brown will not lead Labour into the general election as I believe Labour has more sense to allow that to happened that is why I now think the blog post by Mike Smithson with quotes from a Labour Blogger is something to take notice of.Labour will get rid of Brown most likely at the Labour party conference or just after that leading to Alan Johnson becoming the leader of the Labour party and leading Labour into a general election. And with him as leader Labour might not lose as badly as it would under Brown and this could lead to maybe Labour being the main opposition to Cameron's 5 year government and then going back into government.Yes, I have said it now and this is official on this blog if this is not the case you can hold me to account, David Cameron will only...