The search for a British primary

By David Lammy MP / @DavidLammyMP

Anyone who says the Labour party has run out of energy should have been at the Progress debate on primaries last week. This was a debate from the old school: serious, hard-hitting, but respectful. It is a debate that is critical to the future of democracy – about a forward-looking vision of participation against the politics of yesterday.

It is now time to be clearer about what type of primary we might require. We must be certain that whatever model we propose, it is progressive, inclusive and fair.

Firstly, primaries need not and must not be skewed in favour of wealthier candidates. A progressive primary model would impose strict spending limits on selection expenditure so that no candidate is selected by virtue of the money they parted with during the primary. Indeed, such a spending limit would be an advance on what we have at the moment, where there is no spending cap and candidates have been known to spend upwards of £4,000 in their bid for selection.

Secondly, primaries must not be too expensive to run. As the Greek socialist party PASOK has shown, people are willing to pay a very small fee – in this case two euros – to vote in a primary election. The Totnes primary cost the Tory party £40,000, or roughly £2.50 per voter. But if we looked towards online voting to cut costs, our primary could be paid for in full by each voter contributing as little as £1.

Thirdly, we must maintain the value of party membership. Members are the guardians of our conscience – and I believe that they should have a greater say in our policy formation. Candidates should only be drawn from the active, fully-paid up membership. Equally, there should be no question of the central role of the CLP in selecting the shortlist.

Fourthly, we should look to a primary system which engages with the community much more widely. In a world of more fluid political identification, where mass membership structures are being replaced by looser, more spontaneous forms of association, we must seize the moment to make radical changes to the internal workings of the Labour party. As Unite’s recent campaign on agency workers highlighted, the great majority of my constituents – people who work in KFC, or agency workers cleaning London’s offices – are not members of trade unions. They do not feel they have any involvement in party politics – yet they share the values of the Labour movement. Their personal preference or circumstance need not prevent them from retaining some form of relationship with the party. And giving them a role in the selection of candidates would make them more active and vocal advocates of our cause.

The use of a designation such as ‘Friend’ or ‘Supporter’ of the Party, which entails little obligation or cost, would allow a more expanded electorate for possible primaries, and ground candidate selection in the wider community. And a candidate chosen by a whole section of the community, registered as Labour supporters and paying a small fee to participate, would have a serious head-start in securing a Labour victory, compared to one chosen by only 40 members.

The great challenges facing us in the twenty-first century – from tackling climate change to rebuilding the public realm – are collective. In each case, solutions will be found by bringing people together in common endeavour. And in each case, action will need to be backed with real political legitimacy. I believe that primaries are one way to achieve that. There is no reason why they cannot be held in a way that reinforces true progressive Labour values.

<!–

tweetmeme_source = ‘talktweetmeme’;
// –>