Introducing Mark Ferguson, LabourList’s new deputy editor

By Alex Smith / @alexsmith1982

Over the past week, the eagle-eyed amongst you will have noticed the new prominence of Mark Ferguson in these pages. Mark is LabourList’s new deputy editor, and I wanted to introduce him formally.

Mark is from Gateshead, and until recently he was Islington Labour’s borough organiser. His success there is self-evident: Mark helped Emily Thornberry to increase her majority significantly, against all the odds; doubled Jeremy Corbyn’s majority to above 12,000; and Labour won the council back from the Lib Dems by 35-13. Through his work there, I and others came to rely on his judgement, intense work ethic and personal and professional skills.

As deputy editor of LabourList, Mark will be invaluable to me for many reasons. He is committed and thoughtful, and although he knows the Labour Party and the webspace inside out, he is not an insider: like me, he only joined the party a couple of years ago. I think that extra perspective is healthy for LabourList and for the Labour Party, particularly at this time so soon after our general election defeat and a time when we are seeking as a party to invite new people to our movement. So Mark’s remit is to be as honest and open about the party he loves as he sees fit.

Mark has already made LabourList a better product. Lisa Nandy’s new column is his brainchild, and we’re hoping to commission a number of new columnists from all across the labour movement over the coming days and weeks. Sharing the workload between two people will also enable us to better cover the leadership election: the return of the 8 in the morning feature – which highlights the news and opinion from across the web and papers – for example, is a welcome one. And having two staff members, rather than just one, will allow us each some think time, to better develop our views before publishing.

I think this is a crucial step for LabourList. In the now 18 months since we launched, we have become an important part of the discussion around the party. From linking up with the Huffington Post to hosting events at conference and during the election campaign, to our t-shirts, to helping set the news agenda and reclaiming ground online from the right, to helping to redefine the political webspace as a campaigning areana, rather than just a place for comment, to improving the quality and amount of discussion and providing a genuinely honest and open space for the party, I’ve always been ambitious for LabourList. In eighteen months, well over half a million people have visited the site, viewing over three million pages. Tonight we’re co-sponsoring leadership hustings; I hope more such events will be forthcoming. As Anthony Painter said, “if LabourList didn’t exist, we’d have to invent it”.

Mark will help to consolidate our position of strength, and his arrival is an important part in our development strategy. Because in spite of our successes, and building a network across many web platforms of thousands of people who wish to discuss Labour politics, LabourList still finds it hard to raise funds to survive.

In that sense, taking Mark on now is a risk. But Mark’s full time involvement will enable me to step back from the site a little, in order to raise funds to save the project in the short term, and also to focus on making LabourList a self-sustaining product in the long term.

I hope everyone makes Mark feel welcome, and encourages him to bring a new vitality to the site that I think will be its making.