Initiatives by the Labour leadership make clear that the party is at last about to recover its fundamental defining role as a democratic campaigning organisation for the values of social justice, equality, public service and accountability. After the long, dark interregnum of the Tony Blair and Gordon Brown years, a major review is under way about every aspect of party organisation and functioning. Proposals to implement the necessary changes will be presented to the party conference in September. To help bring this about, a Campaign for Labour Party Democracy taskforce, which I chair, was set up to propose appropriate reforms. It has now produced its report.
After more than a decade when New Labour’s high command believed that campaigns were primarily about media management run from the centre, the need for activists to be engaged in their communities is being recognised. It’s about time. If ordinary party members and trade unionists had been listened to on council housing, the Iraq war, privatisation and national identity cards, Labour would not have lost five million votes between 1997 and 2010. Now Ed Miliband is committed to creating a “living, breathing party”. The review of Partnership into Power has been widened to cover all aspects of the party’s structure – local and parliamentary selections, the annual conference, the role of the unions and internal elections.
The core of renewal is the resurrection of local parties. We need a big increase in enthusiastic activists, campaigning all year round, identifying with the issues that matter to their communities, welcoming new members. Members must know they have a real voice in the party, feel a common ownership of it and understand they have an opportunity for genuine participation in its workings, even if they recognise that their influence is limited. This is one reason why membership fees should be reduced – at a £41 minimum currently, they are far too high to attract the mass membership we need.
The Labour conference, which under Blair became a showcase for the leader’s speech and little else, has to be reinvigorated with genuine debates and votes on key issues. Composites should be produced well in advance of the conference on the most popular six topics among constituency parties, based on the number of motions submitted on each topic, with another six chosen by the unions and affiliates. For the party’s rolling programme, policy statements from the National Executive Committee or the National Policy Forum should, where possible, contain options which can be decided on by conference delegates. And all party conference documents, including annual reports, policy statements, motions, records of decisions, votes and proceedings, should be published on Membersnet so that all members can get involved if they wish.
Crucially, once conference decisions on vital issues have been made, the party leadership should be expected to take them on board. If the leadership still does not feel able to accept the considered views of the party conference, those decisions must not simply be overruled, as happened all too often under Blair and Brown. Rather, they must remain an issue for continuing negotiation between party leaders and conference representatives until a compromise acceptable to both sides is achieved.
Between conferences and meetings of the NPF, the NEC is the voice of the party in day-to-day dealings with the leader and the Parliamentary Labour Party. Its role and status need to be enhanced in overseeing policymaking, as well as in its traditional functions of campaigning, organisation and finance. It should be consulted about key decisions made by Labour in opposition and in government. Elections to the NEC should attract candidates from all sections of the party, including from the TUC general council (the ban on this should be ended). There should be more NEC members from CLPs – say 12, equalling the number of trade union representatives – and three from the PLP (although excluding government ministers).
The NPF needs a complete overhaul if it is to overcome the widespread cynicism in which it is currently held. Its primary task should be to maintain a rolling policy programme for agreement by the party conference based on policy commissions and ad hoc working groups. It needs to be democratic and inclusive. It should consider options from all sections of the party. In order to ensure proper debates at the annual conference, amendments to the policy programme should, in the absence of a consensus, include options that seek to represent significant strands of opinion in the party.
The NPF should make the best possible use of internet-based consultation in order to gather the views and expertise of party members during its deliberations. Equal representation and weight should be given to CLPs and affiliated organisations, as well as the NEC. And if the NPF is to be really effective, Labour frontbenchers must actively engage with it and its relevant commissions through all stages of the development and implementation of policy.
Elections for the leadership should, wherever possible, be contested. For that reason, the present nomination threshold of 12.5 per cent could be lowered (perhaps to 8 per cent). However, a better alternative might be to apply the 12.5 per cent threshold to the whole electoral college, not just the PLP.
In recent years, there has been much criticism of the way that party elections have been manipulated, with favoured outside candidates provided with preferential access to membership databases and parachuted into safe Labour seats, postal votes abused and even selections marred by acts of sabotage or fraud. All this must be cleaned up. There needs to be a clear line of accountability of officials to the NEC through the general secretary. A charter of members’ rights should be introduced, together with an ombudsman and a code of ethics. Within this structure, party officials must observe the civil service principles of integrity, honesty, objectivity and impartiality.
These reforms would restore the buzz and excitement that has been lacking for many years. And they would create the campaigning party we need to win.
Michael Meacher is Labour MP for Oldham West and Royton
