Bye bye Edward Colston!

Subject: BRISTOL COLSTON STATUE PULLED DOWN 

Momentum Bristol

@MomentumBristol

Bye bye Edward Colston! If anyone misses this statue they need to have a long hard think about their priorities. Slave traders are not heroes! #BlackLivesMatter

#BLMbristol #Bristol

Click on live link below to see video:

https://twitter.com/i/status/1269634408069435392

***********************

The lady doth protest too much, methinks

By Les May

TODAY I listened to the Labour MP Stella Creasey on the BBC2 Politics Live programme complaining that she is being harassed.  She based this upon the fact that an American group called the Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform (CBRUK) posted billboards showing a foetus, said to be at nine weeks gestation, around her constituency.  The foetus is clearly much older than 9 weeks at which time it would be only about 25mm long, though this is much larger than Creasey’s claim that it would be ‘poppy seed sized’.

Quite why this group have singled out Creasey I don’t know.  Many other MP’s voted in the same way she did on her amendment to extend abortion rights to Northern Ireland.  It passed 332 votes to 99. Certainly it must be a source of annoyance to her and if it happened to me I would not like it. But does it constitute harassment?

Home Office circular 018/2012 (A change to the Protection from Harassment Act 1997) gives some guidance to the police on what constitutes harassment. One thing is clear that the behaviour must occur on at least two occasions.  Does a poster do this? Is a poster sufficiently similar to any of the examples of what constitutes stalking to be construed as harassment?

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/a-change-to-the-protection-from-harassment-act-1997-introduction-of-two-new-specific-offences-of-stalking

This seems to me to be an extreme reaction and if we are going to express concern about the language MPs use and how its effect is to polarise opinions, we need to be concerned with how supposed ‘victims’ react. Creasey has form on this kind of exaggeration.

When Labour MP Clive Lewis made a joking comment at a Momentum event hosted by Novara Media at which Creasey was not present, she complained “It’s not OK.  Even if it’s meant as a joke, reinforces menace that men have the physical power to force compliance.” (Just to be clear the remark was addressed at another man and was in the context of a light hearted game.)

This is how the Guardian reported what someone who was there said:

Novara’s Ash Sarkar, who was compering the event, said:

“I asked the audience for a volunteer to keep score in a gameshow section we were doing. The guy who came up is well-known to us, he’s doing a podcast with us. I gave him the notebook to keep score, and asked him to kneel down so the audience and cameras could see the stage. He made a little face, and then Clive jokingly said ‘on your knees, bitch’, to him.

“The joke was delivered in a spirit of campy humour. It certainly wasn’t this kind of macho expression of sexual domination. It got forgotten as the gameshow went on.”
Sarkar said there was “a rich tradition of leftist, subversive counter-culture, which often has relied on treading lines between the politically correct, the puerile, the extravagant, flamboyant energy that comes with causing a bit of a stir, while also at the same time being inclusive, loving and affectionate”.
Lewis’s comment, she added, “was an expression of a boozy, raucous, party celebration, which was something which at the time made people feel quite close to the people who were on stage, that they weren’t these distant political or commentariat-type figures.
“It was part of an endearing, informal vibe. Had it been used in a way that had made either our audience members, or the volunteer in question, or anyone else on the stage uncomfortable, then I’d be like yeah, let’s have a conversation about its appropriateness. But we can’t mistake puritanism for meaningful action on oppression.
“There’s a certain irony in Guido Fawkes pushing this, when they’ve been one of the chief orchestrators of harassment against Diane Abbott, the most prominent black female politician in the UK.”

For an alternative take on it see:

https://www.spiked-online.com/2017/10/22/clive-lewiss-vile-misogyny/

In her own way Creasey is an extremist even though she always tries to grab the moral high ground. Policing other people’s speech is not a pleasant trait. It’s po-faced and puritanical. It may get praise from people who think like her, but does anyone think that Labour voters give a tinker’s cuss?

The Burnham and Lansman Roadshow hitsTameside!

The Andy Burnham roadshow, is in Ashton-under-Lyne tonight. The Mayor for Greater Manchester, will be speaking at the Clarendon College, on Camp Street, in the town centre - a five minute walk from Ashton bus station and a short walk from the train station. The ticket only event, begins at 7.00pm.

Critics of the Mayor, who was elected in May 2017 on a 28% turnout, say that he's not giving value for money and that he's a bit of a damp squib, for a 'Northern Powerhouse'. On being elected, Burnham, promised to eradicate rough sleeping on the streets of Manchester by 2020. Yet rough sleeping and homelessness, are still a major problem in Manchester, and seem to be increasing. He also promised to reform public transport, making bus fares cheaper and bus journey's more reliable and convenient. Yet, as critics point out, very little seems to have been done despite the Mayor being handed powers under the 'Bus Services Act'. 

While the Mayor, who says he believes in equality, has ruled out reinstating free bus passes for people aged 60, resident in Greater Manchester - which they were entitled to before 2010 - on the grounds of affordability, he has committed to giving healthy and strapping, 16 to 18- year olds, a free bus pass. Initially, he said that this would be self-financing funded by local education colleges, sponsorship and the bus companies themselves. But it was announced recently that council tax bills, across Greater Manchester, will be increased this April to re-organise the regions bus network and to pay for Burnham's promised free bus passes for 16 to 18-year olds. A proposed increase to the mayor's annual precept, a standalone part of council tax bills, ring-fenced for certain uses, would add £9 onto the average  annual Band D bill.

'MOMENTUM' TO BE RELAUNCHED IN TAMESIDE

Jon Lansman

Tomorrow night, (Thursday 24 January 2019 @ 7.30) at 'The New Labour Club', Acres Lane, Stalybridge, the founder of 'Momentum', Jon Lansman, will speaking at a ticket only event. It is understood that Lansman has been invited to re-launch 'Momentum' in Tameside. Although  a close friend of Socialist Jeremy Corbyn, the Daily Express in 2017, disclosed that Capitalist Lansman, had a £500,000 investment in a  company called 'Ortonovo', which speculates on the property market and manages a portfolio of McDonald's restaurants. Ortonovo also runs Corbyn-supporting 'Left Futures'. The embarrassing revelations, emerged just weeks after Momentum launched a mass campaign against the "appalling working conditions" in the fast food giant. 

Scot Labour Boss to crack down on blacklisting

based on information supplied by Joe Bailey.

SCOTTISH Labour leader Richard Leonard claims he will crackdown on outsourcing and blacklisting.  In a speech to the Scottish Labour conference as the party’s leader in Scotland, he condemned firms that exploited and blacklisted workers. 
 
'Our strategy will ensure that we stop once and for all giving millions of pounds of public money in subsidies to exploitative tax-avoiding companies like Amazon down the road in Dunfermline,' he said. 
 
'And that we stop awarding billions of pounds of public procurement contracts to companies which don’t pay a living wage, which use zero-hours contracts and which blacklist workers. So, we meet in Dundee and we applaud the redevelopment of the waterfront, but we condemn the use of a blacklisting company to do it.' 
 
Construction giants BAM and Sir Robert McAlpine have harvested major contracts out of the redevelopment, which includes a new branch of the V&A museum.  Both were backers of the undercover blacklisting organisation the Consulting Association, which was exposed in 2009 for running an illegal blacklist of trade union activists, often targeted for their workplace safety activities.

The  announcement of the victory of Leonard last November, was considered at the time another  triumph for Jeremy Corbyn.  It is believed the Unite union played a significant role in this.

This week saw yet another Corbyn prefered candidate appointed as Labour's general secretary when Jennie Formby, an official from the Unite union.  She defeated Christine Blower, former general secretary of the National Union of Teachers.

Jim Pickard in the Financial Times today described the Ms. Formby triumph thus:
'Ms. Formby's victory ..... demonstrated how comfortable Mr. Corbyn is with Unite, Britain's largest union, controlling many posts in his operation.'

Madam Formby is seen by some as a bit of a brute in the office and some of the staff have been quick to throw in the towel in as soon as it was known she'd got the job.

It also seems that Momentum  has some misgivings about the dominant influence of Unite.  Momentum wants a wider reflection of views within the party than the union base.

******

Mark Birkett: More on Bullying

 by Mark Birkett

THANKS for sending me this. I agree with every point in it except for your rather odd question at the end. 
"Bandwagon"?

 
 That comment seems to imply that Mr Lloyd's imposition as Rochdale's 'choice' by entirely-unaccountable people in London, his subsequent and deliberate failure to answer dozens and dozens of legitimate constituent queries, and my suspension from the Labour party for complaining about the same are not the absolute affronts to democracy I've very accurately highlighted them as.

There is no 'bandwagon' here Brian. The issues are real. For me and for people like Debbie Abrahams. 


It is crystal clear that the Labour Party HQ and NEC are torn between at least two factions within the party - variously described as Trades Unions vs Momentum / Old Guard vs New / Left vs Right . Each side is trying to outdo the other, and elements within each group are engaging in (yes) bullying people. It sometimes takes the form of suspending innocent members like me, who are guilty of nothing more than highlighting the party's wholly anti-democratic MP-selection systems, its non-existent complaints procedure for disputes with MPs and indeed the sheer lack of leadership shown by Jeremy Corbyn in these matters.

And it sometimes takes the form of trumped up charges of bullying against innocent MPs - turning the real bullying argument completely on its head. Poachers turning gamekeepers in effect. I have had similar dissembling nonsense thrown at me. I was made out to have been 'threatening' to Mr Lloyd by the man himself when nothing could possibly have been further from the truth. I have never threatened anyone. And similarly, when the party HQ Investigations Officer Megan McCann wanted to withdraw from having to interview me face-to-face (and risk awkward questions being asked of her and recorded as such) she tried to make out I had been 'threatening' to her too. It's all a smokescreen. The real bullies are those who are making these spurious bullying claims in HQ and on the NEC.

Complicated to follow perhaps, but if you're going to report this story, please try to do so with considerably more detail so you actually get it right? Otherwise, you are actually just muddying the waters and leaving your readership none the wiser.

Mark

******

Former Gay Mayor 'gutted' after his de-selection!

Carl Austin Behan - former Gay Mayor of Manchester

A former Mr Gay UK who was the first openly homosexual man to be elected the Mayor of Greater Manchester, has been blocked from standing in May's council election because of de-selection by Labour Party members.

Carl Austin-Behan, said he was "hurt, upset and gutted" after a packed meeting of Labour's Burnage branch, decided not to back him to stand again. According to Labour sources, Momentum activist, Ben Clay, is likely to be adopted by Labour Party members.

Although Austin-Behan's supporters claim that the gay councillor is the victim of a witch-hunt and a Momentum 'coup' within his Burnage branch, others have said that the decision to de-select him, had more to do with his lack of visibility within the ward.

Following his election as the Mayor of Manchester, Austin-Behan, pledged to use his year in office to highlight prejudice towards the "tran's community" and to work to make HIV testing more readily available in Greater Manchester.

What the Mayor thought about child poverty and homelessness in Greater Manchester wasn't clear, because he was too wrapped up with LGBT issues. This led to accusations that his horizons were severely limited and didn't stretch much further than Canal Street and the 'Gay Village' and that he was politically myopic.

Cllr Austin-Behan said: "The Labour Party I knew and loved was democratic and I genuinely wish the best for the person who will replace me."

Dire Predictions at Momentum Meeting

TONIGHT's meeting of Rochdale's Momentum group at the Woolworth Social Club was a pensive affair, as the anxious supporters of the Rochdale Labour Party pondered the probability of disaster at next May's local elections if Richard Farnell, the present leader of the Labour group, hangs on to power as Labour leader of Rochdale Council.

I had expected a lively desire to dance on Councillor Farnell's grave, given his poor performance at last week's Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse.  But the two dozen or so participants at tonight's event were gloomy about the future prospects for the local party.

The current official Labour Party position regarding the Inquiry into Child Sex Abuse, is that it will not comment until the Inquiry publishes its report on the 26th, April 2018.

Richard Farnell could remain in office until then at least, given that it s estimated that about 70% of the Rochdale Labour Party councillors are still apparently giving him their support.

Tonight, it seemed, that only a miracle could rescue the Rochdale Labour Party in time for next year's local elections.

******

Scottish Labour Leader Resigns

SPECULATION over the departure of Kezia Dugdale, the leader of the Scottish Labour Party is rife throughout the British media.  Some are suggesting that she jumped before she was pushed, having previously criticised Jeremy Corbyn. Others suggest it is for personal reasons, which is what she says in her long letter of resignation.
Meanwhile,Harriet Harman has already called on Jeremy Corbyn to appoint a female replacement for Kezia Dugdale amid claims the Labour leader has a problem with women.
There are other difficulties and constitutionally the Scottish Labour party is registered with the Electoral Commission as an Accounting Unit (AU) of the UK Labour party, and is therefore not a registered political party under the terms of the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. 
Consequently when Johann Lamont resigned as the Scottish Labour Party leader after the referendum in 2014, she angrily suggested that London persisted in treating Scotland 'like a branch office'.
Jonathan Freedland wrote in the Guardian today:
'Scottish Labour membership has increased in the Corbyn period, but not by the phenomenal degree it has elsewhere in the UK. The scope for a Momentum-style surge in Scotland is limited. The left is a crowded marketplace in Scotland, with competition from the SNP but also the wider yes movement, including the Radical Independence Campaign, to say nothing of a Scottish Green party that can claim more MSPs than the Lib Dems.'
Only last weekend the Sunday Herald newspaper in Scotland devoted two pages last weekend to speculating that Momentum were keen to get rid of Dugdale, along with Brian Roy, the Scottish party secretary, and, indeed, Iain McNicol, the UK general secretary – to make way for Corbyn’s true believers. The Herald quoted extensively from the upcoming edition of the Scottish Left Review, which backs the UK leader and seems to think elements of Scottish Labour are holding back the red Corbyn tide.
In a recent issue of the Scottish Left Review (issue 100) Carolyn Leckie in an article titled 'INDEPENDENCE IS STILL A GAME CHANGER' has written:
'In 2017, radical and progressive ideas are more popular in Scotland than for many decades.  Yet the left is more diffuse and fragmented than ever before.  There are radical leftists in the Scottish Green Party, RISE, the SSP, the Labour Party, the Communist Party and in groups like Common Weal and Women for Independence.  And, there are more socialists in and around the SNP than in all of these organisations combined.'
While there is voter fatigue in Scotland it seems the independence debate informs almost every aspect of Scottish political elections.

U.S. Senators support bill making protests against the Israeli occupation of Palestine a crime!

GAZA 2014

WHEN the former Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, said that Adolph Hitler had supported 'Zionism', he was denounced in some circles as a Hitler apologist.  However, when he was dragged before Labour's National Constitutional Committee, he wasn't charged with anti-Semitism, but with bringing the Labour Party into disrepute, the catch-all clause favoured by many organisations aimed at silencing and censuring critics within their ranks.

Likewise, when the former chair of 'Momentum', Jackie Walker, stated in a private conversation that:  'Many Jews, my ancestors too, were the chief financiers of the sugar and slave trade...' she was outed by the 'Israel Advocacy Movement' and accused of anti-Semitism and suspended by the Labour Party. 

Some pundits have argued that many of these type of accusations of anti-Semitism are not only bogus and spurious, but are really  aimed at trying to silence the critics of the Israeli State, such as the peaceful 'Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions' (BDS) movement and anti-Zionist supporters of the Palestinians. The type of people, for example, who condemned the shelling, bombing, and drone strikes, that killed 1500 civilians in Gaza in 2014, one third of them children.  When the man who ordered this attack, Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin (Bibi) Netanyahu, addressed the US Congress in February 2015, he was given 25 standing ovations.

Other critics have also drawn attention to the way in which countries like the UK have adopted the 'International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance' (IHRA) 'working definition' of anti-Semitism which includes over-sweeping condemnation of the state of Israel. Over 400 words long, this definition of anti-Semitism equates criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism and has already been adopted by the British police to help them decide what can be considered anti-Semitism, previously considered as 'hostility or hatred of Jews as Jews.'

Spurred on by this new IHRA 'working definition' of anti-Semitism, a group of Democratic Senators in America, including Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and fellow Senator Chuck Schumer, along with twelve other Democratic Senators around the country, are supporting a bipartisan bill that will make the act of protesting against that Israeli occupation of Palestine a crime in the U.S. If the bill gets passed and is signed off by the U.S. President (Dr Strangelove), Donald Trump, then protests action such as supporting the BDS movement, could result in a million dollar fine and 20 years in prison.

Some argue that if the law passes, it will act as a Trojan Horse to dismantle the first amendment that guarantees free speech and a free press and will define those who engage in peaceful political protests as 'terrorists'.

Unite's Len McCluskey Wins on a Low turn-out

by Brian Bamford

LEN McCluskey, the incumberant, and the favourite to win the election for general secretary of the Unite union, has been re-elected leader.  Yet the victory was much closer than anticipated:
McCluskey won 59,067 votes (45.4%), Gerard Coyne got 53,544 (41.5%) and the rank and file candidate Ian Allinson took 17,143 (13.1%), on a low turnout of just over 12%, the union announced.
The Coyne team was hoping for a high turnout of up to 20% of the membership, which they believed would have ensured a surprise victory.   McCluskey’s vote dropped from 144,570 in 2013 when the turnout was nearly 15%.
As a consequence of these figures the result cannot be seen as a ringing endorsement of the trade unionism or of their influence in British society.  Even among its own membership the Unite union has struggled to interest the members sufficiently to vote for a leader who might cast a shadow over political life.  And if the union leaders cannot even involve their own members in a significant way for such an event as a union election, why indeed should the general public listen to their leaders' deliberations on social or political matters?
It looks like McCluskey has got 60% less of the vote he got in 2013:  144,570 in 2013 down to 59,067 votes in 2017.
Today, The Guardian website reports:
'Coyne’s camp will this weekend take legal advice over unsent and late ballot papers and what they see as a flawed electoral process.
'Coyne, who ran a campaign alleging that McCluskey was misspending members’ money and was too involved in national politics, responded to the result with a statement calling for McCluskey to change the way the union was run.'
Gerard Coyne is now saying:
'The union machine consistently attempted to bully and intimidate me, something that has continued even after the close of polls.'
'Turnout has fallen disastrously. Many members have reported to me that they did not get their ballot paper at all or, if they did, that it arrived literally on the day polls closed and so was useless. This was no vote of confidence, with falling turnout and a halving of Len McCluskey’s previous vote.'
Wil Hutton on The Guardian website on the 9th, April, arguing that the British left is in 'a malaise', wrote;
 'The brutal truth is that trade unions need root-and-branch reinvention to attract new members. Then, from the legitimacy won by having a base of rising membership, they could start to insist on the rewriting of fairer laws that incorporate new forms of collective bargaining and participation and so recast the increasingly high-risk, low-quality character of the British workplace. McCluskey, like the current Labour leadership he so generously but misguidedly backs, is nowhere near thinking through what is needed.'
I have listened to the arguments for McCluskey and they fixate upon his links to the old left, that he once was a supporter of Militant and he once had a job in the docks in Liverpool.  But I believe my branch members - the members of Bury Unite Commercial Branch - were right to nominate Ian Allinson and get him on the ballot paper to open up a debate and deny McCluskey a coronation.  They were right to do that even though Ian Allinson was a rank outsider.  But in the same way and for the same reasons I agree with the economist Wil Hutton, when he writes 'Coyne is at least attempting to open up the debate about how Unite can grow. The union has an income of £170m; Coyne calls for more transparency in how this money is spent, disputing sweetheart deals backing Jeremy Corbyn'.
It is also clear for anyone who gives the matter any serious thought, that Wil Hutton is right when he argues: 'McCluskey, Corbyn, John McDonnell and the leaders of Momentum are not moving beyond slogans and their preoccupation is less with winning power than hard wiring ancient and outmoded left positions into union and party policies that turn Labour into an unelectable social movement.'
It is not that the old British left is too radical, it is that they are too conservative.  The minds of these men McCluskey, Corbyn and McDonnell are the minds of men who have gramaphone records for brains whose needles have become stuck.  Such men are inadequately placed to solve the current social and political problems.

Unite Election for General Secretary gets dirty

AN e-mail (see below) has been issued by the Acting General Secretary of Unite, Gail Cartmail, seeking to make Unite memebers aware of a publication 'Unite Herald' apparantly issued by one of the other candidates.  It the light of the forthcoming election for General Secretary she claims the 'material contained (in the publication) is also potentially defamatory of Len McCluskey' one of the candidates in the election for General Secretary and widely regarded as the favourite.  

The e-mail is in the form of a warning to members 'of the potential implications of distributing “Unite Herald” ', reminding them of the contents of Rule 5.2.

This e-mail comes a day after an allegation by the deputy Leader of the Labour Party, Tom Watson, hadclaimed the grassroots Momentum group is trying to increase its influence by obtaining funding from the Unite union.  Unite, which is Labour's largest financial backer, has denied this.

Meanwhile, one of the candidates for Unite General Secretary, Gerard Coyne campaigning in Scotland has told activists:
'I don't think it is the job of a union leader to be advising Scottish politicians on which parties should be forming coalitions with one another. That is their responsibility.
'And what I won't do is expend Unite's resources dabbling in Scotland's internal political affairs, except where the direct interests of Unite members are at stake.'

Unite General Secretary Election

Dear Colleague,
You may have received copies of a “newspaper” called “Unite Herald” in your branch or workplace within the last 48 hours.
It needs to be made clear that this is not an official publication of Unite the union.  It is in fact campaign promotional material for one of the candidates in the present election for General Secretary.
The publication in question consists almost entirely of attacks on the incumbent General Secretary of the union.  It disregards the recent statement by your Executive Council calling upon everyone campaigning in the union elections campaign to conduct themselves in a respectful manner, specifically not in a way that could bring damage to the reputation of the union or discredit on a fellow member.  The Union is seeking legal advice regarding potential defamation claims and regarding breach of the union’s trademark arising from this publication. 
The material contained is also potentially defamatory of Len McCluskey.  
All workplace representatives should therefore be aware that distribution of “Unite Herald” could potentially lead to the distributer being exposed to legal proceedings for defamation. 
All workplace representatives are also reminded of Rule 5.2:-
“A member must not knowingly, recklessly or in bad faith provide the Union with false or misleading information relating to a member or any aspect of the Union’s activities.”    
The union will of course be dealing with this publication through other avenues, but lay officials and representatives should be aware of the potential implications of distributing “Unite Herald”. 

In solidarity
Gail Cartmail
Acting General Secretary

Labour Leadership Like Death Warmed-up!

REPORTS suggest that Jeremy Corb, the Labour Party leader, Jeremy Corbyn is coming under more pressure to pack it in, as the results of the defeat of Labour in Copeland in Cumbria began to circulate.  Meanwhile in Stoke Central in Staffordshire, Gareth Snell defeated Paul Nuttall by 7,853 votes to 5,233, giving him a majority of 2,620. 
Looking like death-warmed-up Jeremy Corbyn this morning told Sky News that Labour is in 'good heart' despite losing a safe seat ibn Cumbria to the Tories.  The Copeland constituency is an area held by the party since 1935.
Mr Corbyn told Sky when asked whether he would step down:  'I was elected to lead this party, to oppose austerity and oppose the redistribution of wealth in the wrong direction, which is what this Government is doing.'

Jeremy Corbyn has claimed Labour is in 'good heart' despite losing a safe seat to the Tories, in an area held by the party since 1935.

The Labour grassroots group Momentum this morning said the loss of Copeland was the 'result of 40 years of neglect by political establishment. Labour must win back the trust of those who have been left behind.'
Mr Corbyn said last night that the party needed to do more to reconnect with voters.

Is Watson the 'King Maker' in Labour's leadership election?

by Les May

Originally published in September 2015 an article in the Daily Telegraph contained the following passages; '

During the leadership election, the New Statesman quoted a Labour insider talking about Mr Corbyn and Mr Watson as Trotsky and Stalin. It’s an apt metaphor. Mr Corbyn is an ideologue and a thinker, while Mr Watson is an organiser who understands supremely well how to marshal and employ political power, sometimes to destructive effect. A mere junior minister in Tony Blair’s government, in 2006 Mr Watson assembled and deployed the forces that drove Labour’s most electorally successful leader from office the following year.' and 'A lethally efficient political fixer, Mr Watson works tirelessly behind the scenes to bring the Labour movement under his control.' 

The New Statesman passage published some five weeks before Corbyn was elected leader read;

'And if, as looks likely, Tom Watson becomes deputy leader, would his opponents in the PLP risk handing full control over the party to Watson? One insider described the transition as “swapping Trotsky for Stalin” 

The Stalin jibe comes from the fact that to seize power he constantly expanded the functions of his role as General Secretary of the Central Committee, all the while eliminating any opposition. I did not see these articles at the time. But now that I have it has made me wonder. Are we missing something in thinking the Labour leadership contest is between Corbyn and Smith?

At this point I had better declare an interest. As in the last leadership election contest I will not have a vote nor am I a member of Momentum. But I would readily vote for a Labour party lead by Corbyn. So what I have to say about Smith is not entirely impartial. I find Owen Smith 'a lightweight'. If this is the best 'the plotters' can do then I'm surprised they had the cheek to bother. He may be running on much the same platform as Corbyn, but I'm not sure he has 'the bottle' to carry it out when faced with the murmurings from the still present Blairites (a.k.a Bitterites). Certainly I don't think he would be half so tenacious as Corbyn in insisting that he had a 'mandate' from the membership if Labour's poll ratings did not start to pick up quickly. But perhaps that is the point of the exercise. If Watson really is trying to bring the Labour movement under his control, as the writer of the Telegraph article suggested a year ago, then what better way to do it? Watson has shown a remarkable enthusiasm for using the money from members who joined the Labour party after mid January to make sure they are not eligible to vote. The assumption is that this will help Smith by reducing votes for Corbyn.

Perhaps the expectation is that a Smith win would lead to the pro-Corbyn membership dwindling away and the remainder would accept the safety of a more centralised control and as one Corbyn supporter put it to me 'act as postmen for Labour candidates at election time'. That's something the Parliamentary Labour Party might find very much to its taste if recent performance is anything to go by. If that line of thinking is correct then it would make Watson not just 'the king maker' in this election, but 'the power behind the throne' for the foreseeable future. Perhaps the Labour leadership contest isn't about politics after all. Perhaps its really about who wields the power. If you do have a vote in the ballot please think very carefully how you use it.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/07/12/tom-watson-masterful-organiserskilled-political-assassin-and-je/ http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2015/08/what-happens-if-jeremycorbyn-wins https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Stalin

'Momentum' growing in Tameside against Blairite cronies!

Pro-Business, councillor Kieran Quinn

Last week, Stalybridge and Hyde CLP, voted 68 to 29 in favour of Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the Labour Party in spite of the best efforts of Blairite MP, rotten Jonny Reynolds, to traduce and besmirch the much- loved Corbyn. A source who attended the meeting told NV that Reynolds slagged-off Corbyn and tried to persuade CLP members to adopt the Welsh non-entity Owen Smith. On this occasion the momentum was not in Jonny's favour. Nor did he have much success with his last efforts to get Blairite Liz Kendall MP elected as Labour leader or his best Mate, Peter Mandelson, elected as chancellor of Manchester University. 

Among the higher echelon's of Tameside Labour Party, Corbyn is less popular with the top brass who run Tameside Council. 'Proudly pro-business', Tameside Labour Council leader, Kieran Quinn, voted for Yvette Cooper during the original Labour leadership contest and is in favour of a woman leader.

Quinn, a former post office worker and CWU official, believes that local government is the most efficient form of government. He would believe that, wouldn't he? Both Quinn and his wife Susan, who is also a Tameside Councillor for Droylsden East, pull-in between them over a hundred grand a year in councillors' allowances and expenses including being Chairman of the Greater Manchester Pension Fund and as a Director of New Charter Housing. Although Quinn is reluctant to personally answer correspondence sent to him, he believes that councillors are more accessible to local people than MPs.

Brian Bamford, the Secretary of Tameside Trades Union Council, has told NV that he has been waiting for years to get a written reply from pro-business councillor Quinn, to two letters that he sent him regarding the council's relationship with the construction company Carillion, who have been forced to pay millions in compensation for 'blacklisting' British construction workers.

A local branch of 'Momentum' is now having monthly meetings at the Station Hotel, on Warrington Street, Ashton. Its second meeting takes place on Monday 15 August at 6.30pm. Blairite Jonny Reynolds and the derided carpet-beggar's who run Tameside Council, ought to be wary of deselection and losing their lucrative positions. The 'mighty' Quinn, presides over a council where one-third of the councillors are either married couples, couples or otherwise related, in what is effectively, a one party state of Tameside. It sounds like a shake-up is long overdue and necessary. Now is the time to clean out the Augean Stables.

Danczuk Damns Protest!

by Les May

ACCORDING to the Manchester Evening News the response of Simon Danczuk to today's protest outside his constituency office was as follows:

'This protest has been organised by my political opponents who have formed a bizarre alliance in an attempt to use problems in my personal life as an excuse to try and intimidate me into resigning.'

'This is a group made up of former Lib Dem councillors and the far left.  There has even been a suggestion that Momentum members have invited the North West branch of the EDL to take part today.'

This quote is Danczuk in full fantasy mode.  The claim that anyone invited the North West branch of EDL to take part is just an example of his over active imagination at work.  It's another of his attempts to smear people who disagree with him.

I went along because Danczuk has turned the name of Rochdale into a laughing stock.  As an MP I want him to act with the same sense of responsibility as any other professional.  And when he demonstrates he has about the same level of self control as an oesophagous joined to a pair of testicles, I want to see him treated in the same way as any other professional would be treated in similar circumstances.

Would you want your doctor to behave in the way Mr Danczuk has?  Would you complain if your child's teacher behaved like him?  Would you accept the excuse that he or she had been feeling low, or had drunk to much?

These are the standards against which Mr Danczuk's antics should be judged.

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/simon-danczuk-dismisses-suggestions-not-10682047 

As for me being there because I'm on the 'far left' you can get my take on politics at:

http://northernvoicesmag.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/why-burnham-cooper-and-kendall-deserve.html  

Rochdale Campaign Against Trident

Dear All,

If you can get to St Chads in Rochdale on Tuesday 9 February 2016, please reserve this date.

The meeting is supported by Rochdale and Littleborough Peace Group, Rochdale Green Party and Momentum (Rochdale, Heywood and Middleton).

Natalie Bennett (leader of the Green Party) and others will be speaking and we want a big turn-out to build support  both for the ongoing campaign against Trident and for the national demonstration on Saturday 27 February 2016.

Please, also:

1. Spread the word

2. Whether you are likely to want tickets for the Rochdale coach on 27 February 2016.

Best wishes,

Philip