With Ed Miliband’s resignation Labour is once again looking for a new Leader. Many in the Party wanted a long contest to encourage a debate on policy. But in reality the differences between the policies of most candidates is hard to see.
Decades of obsession with the “centre ground” and trying to court the rightwing press has lead to a situation of endlessly trying to almost mirror the Tories and Liberals on policy to the point of political impotence.
We are just nibbling round the edges of the problem – the fundamental inequality of our country.
We need a change. We need to remember who we are.
With that in mind our Branch Executive Committee have discussed the candidates and voted to recommend you give your support to Corbyn and Watson.
Why Jeremy Corbyn?
Simply put he shares our values. He believes that “Labour must become a social force for progress again”. He believes that Labour should fight injustice and inequality. He opposes austerity. And rightly so. It is failing to deliver an economic recovery. The other candidates are just shifting cuts to different areas. Robbing different Peters to pay different Pauls.
He is also not ashamed to say he supports trade unions. In recent years it has felt like some senior Labour figures would cross the road to avoid us, never mind sit down and talk.
Some people will doubtless say he is too leftwing. But bland centre ground politics isn’t winning elections anymore. It hasn’t for 10 years.
We believe that Britain is sick of stage managed politics bereft of policies that actually do anyone any good.
We cannot continue with a dogma that has lost us nearly every seat in Scotland and has seen people writing to the Manchester Evening News asking if Scotland goes independent can the north join Scotland!
People are not voting Labour because much of what we are offering nationally appears as conservative.
Jeremy Corbyn can deliver the change we need in our party, our movement and our country.
Why Tom Watson?
Tom is a seasoned campaigner. And that’s what the Deputy Leader should be. He wants to take the huge numbers of volunteers we have and give them a new direction.
We have an army of people knocking on doors. But that must be about more than gathering data.
We need to win more voters over on the doorstep.
With 33 years in the party he has respect across the movement as a conviction politician. He was at the forefront of challenging Rupert Murdoch over phone hacking, and in exposing child abuse cover-ups amongst the powerful.
