| Save the Labour Party |
| NEWS RELEASE 02/04
For immediate release Blair invited to debate Labour Party membership London, 9 February Prime Minister Tony Blair is being invited to revive interest in Labour Party membership ahead of this year’s Euro/regional and local elections by the new 'grass-roots' organisation Save the Labour Party (STLP). STLP is holding a fringe meeting at Labour Spring Conference in Manchester on Saturday 13 March. Tony Blair is being invited to share a platform with speakers from across the political spectrum of the Labour Party to boost member morale. Fears of a major electoral setback in June are mounting within the ruling party. At present the Labour Party is faced with mounting evidence of a collapse of both membership and campaigning activity. Under Tony Blair’s leadership, membership has fallen to less than 250,000, fewer than when he was first elected Leader of the Labour Party in 1994. Peter Kenyon, newly elected chair of STLP, said: “It is vital that the Leader uses the Spring Conference to revive interest in the Labour Party as an active mass membership political organisation. This will not only improve Labour’s prospects in June, but strengthen our electoral prospects for a third term in government.” Since its first AGM in Manchester at the end of November last year, STLP has established a website www.savethelabourparty.org and recruited some 120 members from around Britain. It is offering facilities for all 600+ constituency parties to publicise resolutions of current interest. Last week all Labour MPs were offered a briefing about STLP’s campaign (copy attached) after Tony Blair’s address to the weekly Parliamentary Labour Party meeting. STLP published the first resolution received from a Constituency Labour Party post-Hutton and top-up fees warning Tony Blair not to forget about members. The full text agreed by members in the Isle of Wight can be read at: www.savethelabourparty.org/resolutions ends Media Enquiries: Peter Kenyon – 078 0221 6591 eMail: peter.g.kenyon@btinternet.com |