Labour leadership

[killer b]

Jesus Christ, is this for real?

I guess the only upside to this is that hardly anyone will understand what this twat is on about as it is all gobbledygook and no substance.

of course it isn't real.

 

[SpookyFrank]

John Mann's 'we should stop the contest because when we set up an "anyone can register as a supporter and vote for the leader" we didn't think they'd actually do that' is on a par with....Margaret Becket's 'when I said the party should have a wide choice of people to vote for, I really didn't think they'd vote for the person I allowed them to vote for'.

Clueless fuckwits. Mann is proving to be an utterly unprincipled twat. Deploying the 'you did nowt about abuse' dig at corbyn was particularly low. A bit like misusing the holocaust to win a golf club election.

On a similar theme, this from today's torygraph:

A former cabinet minister in the last Labour government said called for the leadership election to be suspended amid fears that Communists and former members of the Militant Tendency have infiltrated the party. “I absolutely think it is a determined and deliberate attempt to infiltrate the election by powerful unions and it is a very serious threat to the democracy of the party,” the senior figure said. “These are not Labour Party people. I think this is a deliberate attempt to infiltrate the party and distort the basic democracy of the Labour Party.”

We must suspend the election because of this threat to democracy. These people don't even hear what they say when they say it do they?

 

[SpookyFrank]

Jesus Christ, is this for real?

I guess the only upside to this is that hardly anyone will understand what this twat is on about as it is all gobbledygook and no substance.

It's not real, but it's a good enough approximation of neoliberal word-salad that it might fool some genuine blairites.

 

[ItWillNeverWork]

of course it isn't real.

You say "of course", but sadly we live in a world where satire and reality are often hard to tell apart.

 

[killer b]

I dunno, good satire should always be vaguely plausible. that article is just a soup of shit buzzwords with no wit used in their arrangement (so maybe actually plausible after all...).

 

[belboid]

Jesus Christ, is this for real?

As its posted by someone calling themselves 'Edgy White Liberal,' I'm guessing at 'no'

 

[Rob Ray]

A former cabinet minister in the last Labour government said called for the leadership election to be suspended amid fears that Communists and former members of the Militant Tendency have infiltrated the party.

The CPB's membership was about 1,000 last I heard, I'd imagine the SP is similar, so even if they were both practicing entryism in cahoots (they aren't afaik, certainly the Morning Star's not "calling on all comrades") it would have a minimal impact on the leadership election. Says alot about the utterly bonkers atmosphere that must be pervading Labour right circles that it'd get raised as a potential issue though.

The spectacle of a Blairite decrying other groups for wanting to hijack Labour and remold it in their own image though, priceless

 

[Pickman's model]

A former cabinet minister in the last Labour government called for the leadership election to be suspended amid fears that Tories have infiltrated the party.

 

[belboid]

The CPB's membership was about 1,000 last I heard, I'd imagine the SP is similar, so even if they were both practicing entryism in cahoots (they aren't afaik, certainly the Morning Star's not "calling on all comrades") it would have a minimal impact on the leadership election. Says alot about the utterly bonkers atmosphere that must be pervading Labour right circles that it'd get raised as a potential issue though.

They (or the Sunday Times at least) were talking about the CPGB, not the CPB. So make that two dozen members.

 

[gosub]

On a similar theme, this from today's torygraph:



We must suspend the election because of this threat to democracy. These people don't even hear what they say when they say it do they?

So when the unions had bulk votes, that was wrong coz they chose lefties, so they changed the rules...now the membership is wrong. Why don't they just save everybody the trouble when they do this again in October and make Leo Ewen Blair "Lord Protector"

 

[Pickman's model]

So when the unions had bulk votes, that was wrong coz they chose lefties, so they changed the rules...now the membership is wrong. Why don't they just save everybody the trouble when they do this again in October and make Leo Blair "Lord Protector"

because he's dead?

 

[butchersapron]

So when the unions had bulk votes, that was wrong coz they chose lefties, so they changed the rules...now the membership is wrong. Why don't they just save everybody the trouble when they do this again in October and make Leo Ewen Blair "Lord Protector"

What lefties did union block votes elect? The union block vote was historically on the right of the party and was effectively the leaderships (and the right) safety net.

 

[gosub]

View attachment 74556
because he's dead?

Looked it up, Leo is the youngest son of Mr Blair. My memory ain't going yet

 

[Pickman's model]

Looked it up, Leo is the youngest son of Mr Blair. My memory ain't going yet

the one who's not the drunk you mean

 

[gosub]

the one who's not the drunk you mean

Any of them would do, protecting the legacy from left wingers who think the Labour party is something todo with them.

 

[mather]

My mistake but as others have said there is so much bullshit out there that it is now getting increasingly difficult to tell satire and reality apart.

 

[Supine]

I dunno, good satire should always be vaguely plausible. that article is just a soup of shit buzzwords with no wit used in their arrangement (so maybe actually plausible after all...).

Sounded like a normal email from my last job. Scarey!

 

[free spirit]

I reported free spirit to the police.

a new low.

 

[brogdale]

a new low.

 

[Pickman's model]

Cheese or beans first?

simultaneous ftw

 

[DotCommunist]

thing is that fptp groups people under a certain tent and then has tendencies within that, so Progress or Socialist Campaign- or the tories 1922 comittee, whattever. It's considered how things are done. To moan that a bunch of left wingers have joined the labour party and that...just fuck off. This is 2015. The cold war is over, you won. So why does it taste like ashes?

 

[agricola]

My mistake but as others have said there is so much bullshit out there that it is now getting increasingly difficult to tell satire and reality apart.

This, really. I spent half an hour reading Lambeth's Councillor Bennett's twitter feed earlier yesterday and I still dont know if he actually exists.

 

[Greebo]

<snip> I spent half an hour reading Lambeth's Councillor Bennett's twitter feed earlier yesterday and I still dont know if he actually exists.

Unfortunately, he does.

 

[andysays]

Harriet Harman: we are weeding out bogus Labour leadership voters

HH reassures us that the electoral system won't be infiltrated by hard left extremists and/or Conservatives out to discredit the process.

She pointed out the party had tracked down some Green party members trying to join the party as bogus registered supporters through social media such as Facebook

And those who are concerned that by signing-up as a supporter they'll effectively be making a donation to LP funds, if their checks are as thorough as she's suggesting, then they're likely to be spending more on them than the £3 sign-up fee - it's the Blue Monday sleeve all over again.

 

[JTG]

Harriet Harman: we are weeding out bogus Labour leadership voters

HH reassures us that the electoral system won't be infiltrated by hard left extremists and/or Conservatives out to discredit the process.


And those who are concerned that by signing-up as a supporter they'll effectively be making a donation to LP funds, if their checks are as thorough as she's suggesting, then they're likely to be spending more on them than the £3 sign-up fee - it's the Blue Monday sleeve all over again.

There's divs all over facebook saying things like 'I'm a member of [party] but I've signed up as a Labour supporter to vote for JC'. It's not hard to find them.

Hang on, that story says Toby Young signed up and has been cast out again

 

[andysays]

There's divs all over facebook saying things like 'I'm a member of [party] but I've signed up as a Labour supporter to vote for JC'. It's not hard to find them.

That still requires people to actually check through facebook posts and match them up to new supporter sign-ups, but according to HH in the article, they're doing rather more than that.

For those who couldn't bring themselves to click on the link, here's some of what it says

“We are policing the integrity of this process. My job is to ensure the rules for this election agreed in 2014 are properly applied. The system is designed to give people that are supporters of the party, but not necessarily a member, a say in choosing the leader of the Labour party.

“I have been concerned right from the outset that we should have absolute integrity in the process and that we should be rigorous and robust in our verification. We have got an extensive verification system in place. We are doing everything possible to ensure the process is valid. Under the old system you could be card carrying member of another party and you still got a vote. We are now requiring people to say if they are Labour party members or supporters”.

Harman said new full party members were being vetted in the normal way, registered union supporters were being checked by the party nationally listening to recordings of recruitment calls made by union phone banks and new £3 registered supporters had to be checked both nationally and locally.

She said any union member could only be recruited to the party as a supporter by a union either by signing in person, or via a recorded phone call, a record of which has to be sent to the party for cross checking. Checks were being made to ensure that single signatures were not being used.

In addition, a special party unit was listening to the entirety of the recording of two-thirds of such calls to check those being recruited genuinely said they were lasting party supporters. Of the remaining third, half were being played back and checked. In the case of those calls not being checked completely, if the party staff thought there was a problem in a batch of calls, the automatic procedure is for the entire batch to be reviewed and listened back. She said there are 48 people working shifts across six days a week listening to these calls. She added she had personally listened to recordings of some of the calls.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Harriet Harman: we are weeding out bogus Labour leadership voters

HH reassures us that the electoral system won't be infiltrated by hard left extremists and/or Conservatives out to discredit the process.

So you can only vote if you're voting for the right candidate. This just gets better and fucking better.

 

[frogwoman]

tbh, i think the labour party are totally within their rights to exclude other parties' members from signing up. if you're a member of say the greens and you sign up as a supporter of one of its competitors it doesn't say much about your faith in that party and its leadership. it's hardly surprising that labour are doing this. what would happen if tusc or the greens got a load of MPs and then people from labour and other groups signed up to push it to the right?

 

[weepiper]

Harriet Harman: we are weeding out bogus Labour leadership voters

HH reassures us that the electoral system won't be infiltrated by hard left extremists and/or Conservatives out to discredit the process.


And those who are concerned that by signing-up as a supporter they'll effectively be making a donation to LP funds, if their checks are as thorough as she's suggesting, then they're likely to be spending more on them than the £3 sign-up fee - it's the Blue Monday sleeve all over again.

Isn't that rigging

 

[killer b]

Did you expect them not to bother checking or something?