by Chris McLaughlin
Labour chiefs are being challenged to be more open over party finances and political management in order to avert “annihilation” at the next general election.
General secretary Ray Collins and other officials face possible legal action to force disclosure of detailed information on the party’s financial position following a long-standing row over the personal liability of members of the ruling National Executive Committee.
It follows a claim by NEC member Peter Kenyon that he has been the target of a gagging attempt after his persistent demands for greater openness over finances and effectiveness in political campaigning produced no substantive change.
The issue came to a head at the NEC’s last meeting when Mr Kenyon, elected on the Grassroots ticket and chair of Save the Labour Party, walked out during an instruction from chair Cath Speight relating to his blog. He later denied he had “stormed out”, saying that he was not prepared to “dignify a kangaroo court with my presence”.
Mr Kenyon maintains that individual members are liable for any financial losses but are being denied the necessary information to discharge their responsibilities. He told Tribune: “This is about the role of each NEC member and our rights to management and financial information required to undertake our duties.
“Access to more detailed information about how the party is run is vital to turning round the 11-year haemorrhage of members, now 60 per cent down on 1997, the loss of local councillors and an increasingly hostile electorate.”
The dispute coincides with other attempts by MPs and trade unionists to inject strategic momentum and policy into the “stasis” of the party’s political management and campaigning. Unions are preparing to overturn Gordon Brown’s reform of internal policy-making by demanding a return at this year’s annual conference in Brighton to the process of resolutions submitted by constituencies and unions. They also want reform of the National Policy Forum, which has failed to deal effectively with Mr Brown’s preferred system by which conference dealt only with debate on subject areas referred on to it for decision.
In a nascent new coalition among MPs, a new campaign has been launched to end what is seen as a political paralysis at the heart of the party with the adoption of stronger leader from the Government and the party with a focus on policies ranging from housing to national identity cards. Both Dagenham MP Jon Cruddas and Labour Representation Committee figurehead John McDonnell were among a group of up to 20 present at a meeting of the Coalition for Labour Victory just before the House of Commons recess .
Their presence was described as coincidental or exploratory but underlines the broader perspective that the party is in a state of torpor.
MP Michael Meacher, organiser of the CLV, said: “The party is in stasis. All is not lost, but we need a mobilisation along the right lines if we are to avert the obvious annihilation that is staring us in the face.”
Ms Speight issued a statement clarifying the instruction to Mr Kenyon, saying that it was “not an instruction not to blog; it was an instruction not to use your blog to make comments that undermine the NEC and the NEC’s governance structures and procedures, particularly in relation to the finances of the party”.
A Labour spokesman confirmed to Tribune that all individual members are individually liable for any losses – and therefore the management of the party finances, the critically contentious point that may yet be the focus of judicial review.
