TinFoilHat
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- 26 Jan 2023
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- 26,454
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- Manchester City
Please read our below statement from the EC
Resignation statement on behalf of Copeland Labour Party Executive Committee & Copeland Parliamentary Selection Committee
In 2020, after he became Labour Party Leader, Sir Keir Starmer said that local Labour members should be able to select their candidates, and that “the party should be at the forefront of championing diversity.”
What we’ve seen, in reality, is the opposite. Local members in Copeland have been denied a vote and a voice by the National Executive Committee. Members in Copeland have been denied a fair selection process, and will not get to choose their own candidate.
The national party has blocked our long-serving Copeland Constituency Labour Party secretary, Cllr Joe Ghayouba, from the long-list of candidates.
Joe is not only a popular local councillor. As secretary he led us to a landslide Cumberland election victory in the 2022 local elections. Joe is a Muslim of Egyptian descent. He fits firmly into the “BAME” group as defined by the Labour Party, for whom rules state there must be at least one representative on any Prospective Parliamentary Candidate long-list. Considering that just a few days ago it was reported by Channel 4 News that Black Labour MPs fear speaking out on issues of race within the party, we should be doing all we can to support members and candidates from ethnic minority backgrounds, rather than blocking them when they stand.
We are particularly disturbed as a CLP Executive Committee to learn that “evidence” brought up at Joe’s due diligence interview centred on a photograph taken by a criminal former Labour councillor. This former councillor, who is currently in prison for child sex offences, waged a racist campaign against Joe and his young family, which was subject to a police investigation. It is beyond comprehension that Labour’s national executive gave credence to such “evidence” in an internal Labour Party selection.
As a result, and in the face of this shameless disregard for democracy and the rights oflocal members, we feel we cannot give legitimacy to an illegitimate process by continuing to serve on the Copeland Labour Party Parliamentary Selection Committee, and are also resigning with immediate effect from our roles as members of the Executive Committee of Copeland Labour Party.
In Solidarity,
Cllr Jean Murray, Executive Committee Chair, Selection Panel member,
Cllr Linda Jones-Bulman, Executive Committee Vice Chair, Selection Panel member and Former Copeland Mayoral Candidate,
Cllr Nicholas Graham, Membership Secretary, Executive Committee and Selection Panel member
Margaret Lamb, Executive Committee Treasurer, Selection Panel member,
Cllr Mike Hawkins, Executive Committee Member and Selection Panel Procedures Secretary,
Flo Hanlon, Woman’s Officer, Executive Committee member,
Karl Connor, Executive Committee and Selection Panel member,
Cllr Graham Minshaw, Executive Committee and Selection Panel member,
Cllr Tony Lywood, Executive Committee member and 2019 Copeland Parliamentary Candidate, Cllr Robert White, Communications Officer, Executive Committee and Selection Panel member, Stan Sanczuk, Executive Committee member.
Media silence in comparison to former leaders is deafening.