#jezwecan – Joan Twelves

I was expelled from the Labour Party without warning at lunchtime on Bank Holiday Monday – and unexpelled at teatime the next day.

“Dear Joan, It has been brought to our attention that you have stood as a candidate for the Socialist Unity Party against Labour….”

What! Who? Where? When?

Unlike most people, I know the answers to these questions, not because I’ve ever stood in an election as anyone other than the Labour Party Candidate, but because it was one of three accusations levelled against me last year when I was blocked from rejoining the Party after years of serious illness. SU stood candidates in the 1979 General Election. That’s right – 1979. 37 years ago. I was not one of them, and I can prove it from public records. Indeed, I proved it last year, just as I proved that I am not a previously expelled Trot entryist.

They’ve been witch-hunting me for 25 years. This is their third attempt to throw me out of the Party.

In 1991 I was Leader of Lambeth Council when we opposed the poll tax and the first Gulf War. Word came down from on high: ‘Thou shalt have no foreign policy other than mine’! 13 of us were banned from the Labour Group and, after months of investigations and hearings, six were expelled and seven suspended. I was NOT one of those expelled – I was suspended from the Labour Group for 12 months.

In 2015 my application to rejoin the Party I had left in 2000 was rejected because I had ‘previously been expelled’. I had to send the Party its own letter spelling out the decisions of its own National Constitutional Committee. It took six months, but I was finally allowed to rejoin.

And now this! No right of appeal – you may apply again in five years’ time…..

To say I was angry is a gross understatement. But because I’ve been there before… and before… I was able to reach out to comrades at the highest levels of the Party and my expulsion was withdrawn within hours. I received an apology for the ‘error’ and my full membership rights were reinstated. Ten days later I received my ballot.

I am told that I should not have been reinvestigated because I won my appeal last year.

Ewan Gibbs in Glasgow got his expulsion retracted for the same reason and because, like me, he was able to contact leading members. But others are less fortunate. Over 3,000 others, including undoubtedly some who won appeals last year and should not have been included.

The Party’s conduct is making people ill and very, very angry. Removing members’ right to vote won’t just affect this Leadership election. Why should anyone who has been treated in this way support the Party in the future? We should be welcoming new members and rejoicing in their enthusiasm, not driving them away.

Of course, a membership organisation like Labour must have the right to check that applicants support its aims and values, and no member should be engaged in any sexist or racist threats or abuse. But such vetting has to be carried out on the basis of openness, clear criteria and due process, not anonymous allegations about retweets and ‘likes’. That is the road to Stasiland.

A Party dedicated to justice, rights and due process has to show that it practises those values in the way it conducts itself and treats its members if it is to have any credibility. There has been little evidence of that this summer. We can and must never let that happen again.

I believe the incoming NEC must launch a thorough investigation into this year’s Purge as well as implementing the Chakrabarti Inquiry’s recommendations in respect of clear and transparent compliance procedures, in advance of an in-depth and long overdue review of the Party’s disciplinary and complaints procedures.

This article has been published in the October 2016 edition of Labour Briefing

http://labourbriefing.squarespace.com/home/

#KEEP CORBYN? – HERE’S WHY!

In the wake of the Brexit vote, the Labour Party is in a state of civil war and its very survival must be in doubt.

Jeremy Corbyn’s supporters are mobilising in his defence. Here are some reasons why his continuing Leadership of the Party is worthy of support.

Won the Leadership with biggest mandate from Party members that any leader has ever won – 59.5% – more than all the other candidates put together.
Placed anti-austerity at the heart of Labour’s policies.
Adopted popular policies such as building public housing and renationalising the railways.
Increased Labour’s membership dramatically – now over 380,000 members.
Won every by-election contested since he became leader, three with increased majorities.
Won all four Mayoral elections in May 2016 – London, Bristol, Salford and Liverpool.
In the 2016 local elections performed as well as 2001 when Labour won a second landslide in the general election.
Repeatedly ahead of the Tories in the polls since the start of 2016.
Fought off cuts to tax credits and benefits, scoring significant blows against the Tories’ austerity agenda.
Delivered 63% of its 2015 voters to vote REMAIN, compared to the SNP’s 64% and the Tories 42%.

ALL this despite constant sniping, undermining and media misrepresentation.

WHAT HE HAS NOT DONE is

Lose the 2010 and 2015 general elections.
Lose 3.9 million voters between 1997 and 2005.
Lose 228,000 Party members between 1997 and 2008.

The coup against Corbyn has absolutely nothing to do with the result of the EU referendum and was reported in the Daily Telegraph on 3 May, 8 weeks before it happened. Despite having been planned for months, the plotters have no agreed candidate, nor policy platform.

Its participants have pursued their plan in total disregard of the seismic shock Brexit is causing the economy, politics and society. When Labour should be seizing the opportunity to destroy the Tories, the coup plotters have seized it to try to destroy their own Party.

It is a political coup against the left of the Party and the policies Corbyn represents– against austerity, war, and Trident; for immigration, nationalisation, a publicly owned NHS and a fully funded welfare state.

Its timing has much to do with the imminent publication of the Chilcot Report and, if it succeeds, Labour Party democracy will be curtailed, Party members will lose their say over policy and representation, and it will mean Labour will continue on its rightward trajectory, alienating its traditional voters and ultimately destroying the Party.

We have been here before – in 1981 when, in opposition to a left-wing leader, the right split and doomed us to 16 more years of Thatcher and Major. Some of the same people are still involved.

The nearly quarter of a million people (235,757 at last count) who have signed 38 Degrees’ petition expressing their confidence in Jeremy Corbyn as Leader need to be listened to by the 176 before they plunge us into an internecine battle where the only winners will be the reactionary right-wing of the Tory Party, the rich and the corporations. The losers will be refugees, migrants, the poor, the sick, the disabled. and the working and middle classes of this country – the very people you were elected to represent.

*******

This is the work of several talented writers and political thinkers. Many thanks to Simon H and James G for sharing their ideas and words.

Part 2 of my Rant – The Carnival of Reaction is Turning the World Upside Down will follow soon.