Labour’s next General Secretary – who’s in the running?

By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk

Update: Lucy Anderson – Former Ken Livingstone staffer and NPF rep, currently working for the NUT, has joined the race.

In just over a month, Labour’s NEC will select arguably the most important person in the Labour Party (or than, perhaps, the leader). Over the next four years they’ll be responsible for getting the party lean, mean, organised, well-funded and ready to campaign in communities and constituencies up and down the country.

It’s not an overstatement to say that the person chosen to take on this role has the future of the party – and Labour’s prospects at the next general election – in their hands.

We’ll be covering the race in more detail in the weeks ahead, but it’s becoming increasingly clear that a field of candidates is opening up. They are:

Joe Irvin – former Brown advisor at No.10

Lord Roy Kennedy – former party Director of Finance and Complainace, now a life peer

Chris Lennie – current Head of Fundraising at the Labour Party and former Acting General Secretary

Iain McNicol – Political Officer of the GMB

Michael Stephenson – Former advisor at No.10, currently General Secretary of the Co-Op Party

We’ll be trying to speak to all of these candidates – and any others that emerge – in the coming weeks. If you know anyone else who is running, or have any information on any of the candidate’s campaigns – let us know.