Lack of selections “unacceptable”, say South East Labour reps

The chair and vice-chair of the South East Labour have written to members of Labour’s ruling body describing the lack of parliamentary selections in the region “unacceptable”.

In a letter to Labour’s national executive committee (NEC), Vince Maple and Elaine Bolton complained about “heading into a second successive general election at which the majority of [local parties] have not had the opportunity to directly select their parliamentary candidates”.

They had been “assured that there would be no further imposition of candidates following the 2017 GE”, the regional reps noted, “and we must reiterate that the key message from our regional board is that it would be unacceptable to have the exact same process we saw in 2017”.

The NEC will meet today, following uproar from members and applicants for vacant seats over the way that parliamentary selections have been handled.

Last week, a number of selections were suspended while others were allowed to continue, and there has been little clarity from the party as to the reasons for their decisions.

Many Labour members have expressed concern that they will not have a say in the selection of local candidates, despite there being time for processes to continue before an early election.

Below is the full text of the letter to NEC members.

Dear NEC member,

We are writing following our September Regional Board Meeting. Our Board was unanimous in voicing its concerns at the possibility of expedited PPC selection processes now being followed, as seen in 2017.

We are a member-led organisation and to be in a position where we are potentially heading into a second successive general election at which the majority of CLPs have not had the opportunity to directly select their parliamentary candidates is unacceptable. We know that several south-east CLPs have already contacted the General Secretary and NEC members to share their concerns.

The specific issues of the south-east region, with over 80 constituencies (more than 60 of which are still waiting to select their candidates), raises specific practical challenges. We know that we cannot put Jeremy Corbyn into Number 10 without increasing the number of MPs in our region.

Our Regional Board was also clear that, if there does have to be a truncated process, any Regional Board participation should be gender-balanced – in our view that would therefore require two representatives. The Board this week agreed that this should be the Chair & Vice-Chair in our case, as we are gender balanced in these two roles. The Regional Board was furthermore explicit that there should be a clearly-identified number of AWS within whatever process is decided moving forward, in order to increase the number of women standing for and being elected to Parliament.

We understand the pace at which events are moving and appreciate the difficulties this raises. CLPs were, however, assured that there would be no further imposition of candidates following the 2017 GE, and we must reiterate that the key message from our Regional Board is that it would be unacceptable to have the exact same process we saw in 2017. There seems to be a systemic failure in this regard and a fundamental review of the parliamentary selection procedure is therefore required as soon as is practicable, particularly for those constituencies where the chances of electoral success are less.

We look forward to hearing from you on this urgent matter.

Vince Maple – Chair
Elaine Bolton – Vice Chair