Young Labour is an opportunity to diversify the Party

By Cat Smith / @IDontDoTwitta

I want to see a youth movement for all young Labour Party members and not just those who keep quiet and shy from debate. If we are truly to be the future of the Party we can’t keep shutting out those who dare to suggest that perhaps not everything the Government has done in the past decade has been for the best. We need to offer a space for debate and exploring new ideas because the agenda is always changing and we need to change with it. Our political aspirations cannot be those of Blair in 1997.

I was 11 when Labour won in 1997, and truth be told I don’t really remember it. I wasn’t from the kind of family that discussed politics over the dinner table. I’m proud of who I am and where I come from, but I know that my background is not typical of the majority of young people I meet in the Labour Party. As Young Labour I feel we really are failing to engage young working class people; everyone seems to have a degree (which in part is credit to the widening of access to Higher Education so credit where credit’s due to Labour there), and often they are from privately educated, Oxbridge backgrounds. I’ve given up trying to pretend I can fit into this box now; I am from a working class family in a northern industrial town and I’m proud!

It is your background that makes you who you are. So when I don’t agree with taking ‘lowering VAT on condoms’ as our key campaign to engage young students when our Labour Government has just introduced top-up-fees that’s probably because I don’t think like you. I think like someone who was terrified of committing to go to university because of fees. I’m scared of debt. I don’t own a credit card and that’s because I’m not from a family that’s ever had spare cash lying around.

We all know that there’s a bit of a boys’ culture in and around the Labour movement, including our youth structures. I want to see more women involved in Young Labour, developing networks and building experience, then the future of our Party is strengthened. We also need to do more building something which is not the ‘white boys club’ and work closely with our black and disabled brothers and sisters. The space of for four elected equalities posts on the new Young Labour Committee will hopefully take a cross-equalities approach to building towards a more diverse and representative party of the future.

Until now I’ve not been able to engage in Young Labour because let’s face it, it’s been inactive for members on the ground. The work that has been done, around membership rates that are affordable, the reform of Young Labour and having elections has been very welcome. Credit to Stephanie for really pushing for this and I wish her the best of luck in her next two years as NEC Youth Rep. I hope that with the first elected Young Labour Committee it will be a new beginning for the youth movement of our Party and one that will bring in young workers, trade unionists and those of us who do not feel like we’re part of some Labour elite.

Here’s to the future… I’m optimistic!