[youngian]

Comrade Mason has threatened to quit unless counter-revolutionary reactionary Jill Mountford is removed. The true voice of proletariat Worker's Liberty won't take this lying down.

“While cowards flinch and traitors sneer….”

Paul Mason was on the Daily Politics (BBC2 12 noon) today.

He said, “I have never been to a Momentum meeting”. Then went on to have a lot to say about it. Specifically, “If Jill Mountford [National Committee member of Momentum] is not allowed into the Labour Party and I cannot see her being… and remains basically an expelled member of the Party and remains in Momentum I will not remain in Momentum.”

What's he saying? Does Paul Mason think all expelled members of Labour should not be allowed in Momentum, (of which there are thousands as far as we know). Does he think Labour's Compliance Unit is doing a bang-up job? Or does he think just Workers' Liberty members and supporters who have been expelled from Labour should be excluded from Momentum?

Or maybe he just doesn't like the far left any more. Or Trotskyists. Agreeing with Tom Watson is his privilege of course. As part of the media establishment, he's got plenty of that. It's a great shame he sees fit to use that privilege to come very close to calling for the permanent exclusion of a socialist from the Labour Party on national television. http://www.workersliberty.org/node/27365" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Annette Scambler @annettescambler
Dont give up on Momentum. Blairites unable to damage Corbyn and are now infiltrating Momentum and trying to kill that. Call their bluff.

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[mattomac]

We are all Blairites now...

[Abernathy]

Have a read of this utter wank, and tell me what you think . As a Brummie (a Scots Brummie, or "Scrummie" if you will) I know it's paranoid bollocks. As a Labour party member, I also know it's bollocks.

But see what you think :

https://skwawkbox.org/2016/12/21/bham-l ... uncillors/

[Malcolm Armsteen]

First of all the author seems to have little acquaintance with Labour Party structures (What, when it's at home, is the 'Labour board'?) and none at all with party rules.

The eligibility of members to vote is in the rule book and NEC decisions of 2016 and easily found.

The language and tone is puerile. I'd put it in the 'Lies' pile.

[Abernathy]

I think he is referring to the governing board of the Birmingham District Labour Party, which is made up of party members.

[Malcolm Armsteen]

And do they have the authority to suspend party rules?

[Abernathy]

The Birmingham Board can and does decide on setting the freeze date to be used for candidate selections. In this case the freeze date that it has decided on to select candidates for council elections in 2018, which will be "all up" elections because the city's ward boundaries are being re-drawn and we are having the number of councillors reduced from 120 to 100, is July 2015, which is earlier than usual, but they are perfectly entitled to do so, and it has bugger all to do with making sure there are anti-Corbyn councillors. Plenty of the existing Labour group in Birmingham who are likely to be selected for 2018 are already Corbyn supporters, for example. And as for not being able to select candidates until 2022, we're all in that boat. The whole piece is fundamentally dishonest, designed to whip up the Corbots" indignation.

[Abernathy]

Relevant section of the rules :

g. Only those members who have been a member for at least 6 months are eligible to attend any meeting in this procedure. A freeze date for calculating this 6-month eligibility may be set by the LCF* with the approval of the RD^(GS). If no such freeze date is set the 6 months shall be counted from the date of the first meeting convened to discuss a shortlist for a particular electoral area.

* Local Campaign Forum (eg the Birmingham Board).
^ Regional Director.

[The Weeping Angel]

The Birmingham Board can and does decide on setting the freeze date to be used for candidate selections. In this case the freeze date that it has decided on to select candidates for council elections in 2018, which will be "all up" elections because the city's ward boundaries are being re-drawn and we are having the number of councillors reduced from 120 to 100, is July 2015, which is earlier than usual, but they are perfectly entitled to do so, and it has bugger all to do with making sure there are anti-Corbyn councillors. Plenty of the existing Labour group in Birmingham who are likely to be selected for 2018 are already Corbyn supporters, for example. And as for not being able to select candidates until 2022, we're all in that boat. The whole piece is fundamentally dishonest, designed to whip up the Corbots" indignation.

Corbynistas and Cybernats are the true progenitors of fake news.

[visage]

Behave.

[youngian]

A definition of fake news would be useful to avoid getting bogged down in whataboutery over piss poor polemics that we don't personally like.

[The Weeping Angel]

A pretty good indictment of momentum

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Last month my local Constituency Labour Party out-voted and crushed the Momentum slate in our AGM. Nearly all the key positions in the local Party were won by a moderate coalition. We smashed Momentum in one of their national strongholds.
Our constituency wasn’t unique, across the board moderates have swept to victories at regional conferences and at constituency level (with a handful of high profile exceptions). Just a couple of weeks ago candidates backed by moderates won all leading positions at a meeting of the party’s National Policy Forum. The forum’s policies shape Labour’s manifesto.
We were successful in my constituency because we were well organised, but crucially, had the numbers. My constituency has been swamped by new Corbynite members, but only a small fraction of these have got involved and actually turn up to meetings.

Momentum’s failure to engage the large swathes of Corbyn-supporting members to actually get involved, attending meetings, and knock on doors, has precipitated the Lefts’ failure to take over Labour’s internal structures.
For all the pontificating about ‘building a movement’, depressingly little has changed at a grassroots level. While Momentum have burnt all bridges with active left-wingers that don’t support Corbyn, most new members are still un-engaged and inactive. Here lies their problem.
The idlenesses of many Corbynites, is a symptom of a shallow and hubristic attitude towards political engagement. Where political convictions can be satisfied by a simple signal of virtue — rather than the slogging work to bring about change.

[The Red Arrow]

[The Weeping Angel]

Tell me Red how are you going to justify your support for Corbyn in the future, when the Labour Party has been reduced to a rump, the NHS and BBC has been privatized and the Tories have been in power for nearly 20 years? Are you going to tell yourself it was worth it?

[Malcolm Armsteen]

Tell me Red how are you going to justify your support for Corbyn in the future, when the Labour Party has been reduced to a rump, the NHS and BBC has been privatized and the Tories have been in power for nearly 20 years? Are you going to tell yourself it was worth it?

What are you blathering about now?