Grassroots « Labour Uncut

“What you talkin’ about, Willetts?” asks Richard Partington

11/06/2010, 10:55:57 AM

Hat tip to John Prescott (http://twitter.com/johnprescott)

Just four months before his ascent to the cabinet, David Willetts published a book that showed how his baby boomer generation “stole their children’s future – and how they can give it back.”

So there is great piquancy in his clearest indication yet that students could be forced to pay higher tuition fees – a move which would condemn subsequent generations to a grim financial future.

In The Pinch, Willetts explains that the baby boomers have attained a position of power and wealth at the expense of their children. Yet his comment that the current cost of students’ degree courses are a “burden on the taxpayer that had to be tackled” shows that he himself holds no remorse.

He has not pre-empted the recommendations of Lord Browne’s independent review into whether fees should rise from £3,225 a year. But he did say that students should consider fees “more as an obligation to pay higher income tax” than a debt.

(more…)

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The electorate gets the government it wants. Alex Norris takes it personally.

10/06/2010, 12:23:40 PM

We’re braced for cuts in Nottingham. As a city, we have rebuffed Conservative advances year after year since David Cameron’s election as leader. But with Cameron now ensconced in Number 10, we’re starting to feel the full force.

The Future Jobs Fund, which has helped 960 unemployed people back in to work in Nottingham alone, was the first to fall. Now we fear for the future of our tram expansion, an expansion set to put thousands into work, millions into the local economy and Nottingham into the picture as the UK’s leading “science city”.

I take what the coalition government is doing very personally. I’d like to voice my opposition to everything they do as loudly as possible at all times. But this is a self-indulgence we cannot afford. (more…)

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How the ward was won: Paul Cotterill

09/06/2010, 10:48:36 AM

In the district elections of 2007, a team of just four activists helped to secure a Labour victory within a safe rural Tory seat never before held by Labour. We saw a 44% increase in the Labour vote since the last time the seat was contested in 2003.

It would be easy to be overly triumphant, and to make claims that ‘all local campaigns should be run like this’. In fact, we followed the general campaigning guidance issued from the Labour party centrally and regionally. But we do believe that other specific lessons might be learned from what we managed to achieve.

First, we had a different approach to the press. The standard Labour campaigning message is that all opportunities to raise the profile of the party, and especially the candidate in the local press should be seized. In the Bickerstaffe campaign this was not done, and there were no press releases or calls to the press of any kind.

(more…)

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Let’s stop the robot-talk and really communicate on the doorstep, says Peter Newlands

08/06/2010, 10:46:08 AM

I don’t mind smiling and clapping when a shadow minister arrives at the church or community centre they’re stumping at that day. I understand the arrangement; it looks good on television to have shiny supporters filling out the screen.
The difficult part to swallow is when the cameras are off and we’re in the pub afterwards. I’ve spent many a night getting upset when an earnest young supporter defends some bizarre policy thought up by the high command.

I lie awake after returning from a day’s campaigning and wonder what goes on in the minds of these people. I struggle to believe that they are stupid, or gutless; but I also find it hard to accept that any supporter really came into politics with a gripping desire to lengthen the time we could detain a terror suspect without charge to 90 days. (more…)

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The Tories’ lust for cuts reveals itself in local government already, says Amanda Ramsay

07/06/2010, 02:16:47 PM

When David Cameron coined the phrase “Big Society”, no one really seemed to know what he meant. But take a look at new-style Tory Councils and see how the Prime Minister was sign-posting a well thought-out, ideological intention to take government back to laissez-faire, sink or swim politics, where the state sits back and does the very bare minimum.

It is at local government level that Cameron’s cuts will be fought out. So expect to hear free-market buzz words like “outsourcing”, “privatisation”, “small government” and “consumer choice” as key parts of Cameron’s Conservative vision for municipal governance.

No wonder we’ve heard so much from John Redwood since the Conservatives formed their coalition with free-market zealots Nick Clegg and David Laws. (more…)

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Twitter 1 Greencoat Boy 0, says Grace Fletcher-Hackwood

06/06/2010, 09:00:30 AM

Imagine this scene – or, if you’re one of the many people it’s happened to, remember the last time it happened to you.

You’re with a group of friends and colleagues, heading to a pub after a meeting. There are a lot of you so you’ve booked ahead. Except that when you get there, the manager says he’s not going to serve you. Because you and your friends are gay, lesbian, bisexual and/or transgender.

Oh, and by the way, it is 2010.

Maybe you’d have left without wanting to make a fuss. Maybe you’d have reminded the manager that he was breaking the law, and taken your custom elsewhere. (more…)

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Good MPs and committed activists DO make the difference, says Bex Bailey

06/06/2010, 08:27:52 AM

Douglas Alexander called it the “word of mouth election”. Gordon Brown said it would be fought “street by street, school-gate by school-gate, workplace by workplace”. And now Labour leadership candidates trip over each other as they scrabble to praise our grassroots supporters.

I spent the election campaigning for Vernon Coaker in Gedling, the only key seat retained in the East Midlands. What I saw there was a campaign with local activism at its heart that produced a victory many thought unlikely.

In the speech announcing Labour’s campaign pledges back in February, our then Prime Minister said that the party’s secret weapons in the upcoming election were our beliefs and our policies. This was true. But our other secret weapon was each and every supporter of the Labour party. Those people who were out talking to voters, come rain, shine, or (as was the case many times in Gedling) snow. (more…)

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Crowdsourcing the leadership election

05/06/2010, 11:23:19 AM

What are the leadership contenders like? Can we trust them? Would they make good friends? Would they make good leaders?

These are basic questions to which it would be nice to know the answers. A 30 minute interview between each candidate and each party member would be nice.

But not really practical. There are, however, very many Labour members and supporters who, over the years, have had dealings with the leadership contenders.

Did Ed Miliband come to your GC? Did you once play football with Ed Balls? Was David Miliband the comedy brainy kid at your inner London comprehensive? Do you remember Diane Abbott from Cambridge? Did you do A levels at night school in Burnley with John McDonnell?

You did? Good. This is the place to tell your story. Post your experience below and help the rest of us decide – based on what the candidates are really like in real life – who to vote for.

This thread will be moderated and nothing off-topic, obscene or libelous will be published.

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Brothers stand fast against a “grand coronation.” Alex Halligan reports.

04/06/2010, 04:46:41 PM

Delegates at unite’s policy conference voted to ensure that all candidates are on the ballot in the labour party leadership contest. This is effectively an endorsement of the veteran leftwing MP John McDonnell. Unite is in the process of contacting MPs in their Parliamentary group and urging them to “nominate wisely” to ensure a proper contest.

The union boasts by far the largest Parliamentary group. And its influence within the party is far-reaching, having donated £11 million pounds in four years.

A packed fringe meeting hosted by unite’s ‘united left’ faction met in Manchester on Wednesday night and was addressed by McDonnell. Delegates cheered the rebel MP as he urged them to over-rule the unite executive, which they duly did the following day. (more…)

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