| Save the Labour Party |
| CAMPAIGNS |
| The STLP National Committee is meeting on 8 April 2006 in London to review all current campaigns in the light of recent developments. The need to rebuild membership has been brought into sharp focus by the "loans for lordships" scandal now being investigated by the police, two House of Commons Select Committees: Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs, and the Electoral Commission. The alternative - state funding - being promoted by the Labour leadership, on a cross-party basis, poses a real threat to the federal constitutional structure of the Labour Party. This initiaitive is being explored by an Inquiry set up by the Prime Minister under former civil servant, Sir Hayden Phillips. This is despite a report on Party Funding published by the Electoral Commission following a year-long inquiry presented to Parliament barely 15-months ago. Unsurprisingly, it did not recommend any significant increase in political party funding by taxpayers. New research on Labour Party membership is being undertaken by Prof Stuart Weir of the Democratic Audit at the University of Essex on behalf of the Labour Commission. It will be in the field with a YouGov poll of members and former members shortly. Campaigning inside the Labour Party is likely to focus on the Leadership and the need for a Party Leader with a fresh mandate from Labour Party members sooner, rather than later. This is symptomatic of the need to restore accountability, party and parliamentary democracy. That agenda extends (for example) to calls for a formal AGM to enable the NEC to explicitly hold themselves to account for their management of the party between conferences, an elected chair to end the confusion over the use by Labour in government of monarchical powers without securing democratic consent from Labour Party members for de facto changes to the Party Constitution, and the introduction of OMOV (one-member-one-vote) for the election of National Policy Forum candidates. The big question in 2006 is whether the Party Renewal agenda will provide a rally point for some of the ideas cited above to flourish. Peter Kenyon - chair, STLP |