Dear All
Do you know what leadership is?
If you look it up online you get:
‘Leadership, the action of leading a group of people or an
organization, or the ability to do this’.
Now, do you know what team work is?
‘Teamwork, the combined action of a group, especially when
effective and efficient’.
In politics, if helps if you have three things, leadership
ability, be able to work as part of a team and last but not least have vision with and the ability to adapt.
The big Labour Councils in Scotland decided that being part
of Cosla, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities was a bad thing and
detrimental to their areas. So, South Lanarkshire, Glasgow, Aberdeen and
Renfrewshire wanted to go their own way, at the time, I thought this was
unusual.
Now, we have Eddie McAvoy, Labour leader of South
Lanarkshire, saying there "may be merit" in his authority rejoining
Cosla.
So, is McAvoy failing to demonstrate teamwork or is McAvoy
demonstrating leadership?
Have a think about this and see what answer you come up
with!
Scottish Labour in the past has had a rather bad habit of
pushing through ideas at various levels in local government only to do rather
embarrassing U turns, the one that really sticks with me is former MSP Paul
Martin wanting to scrap hospital parking charges brought in under Labour PFI
schemes. Now when in opposition he was outrage the charges he helped bring in
affecting people actually affected people.
Why was it right to bring in PFI charges in the first place
then wrong later on?
Was Paul Martin MSP demonstrating leadership by bring the
charges in or leadership for campaigning to get rid of them, did he demonstrate
teamwork both campaigning for and later against the thing which he supported?
At present the Labour Party has just come through a very bad
leadership contest which solved nothing, Jeremy Corbyn is still the leader as
the membership decided rightly to back him over Owen Smith.
I voted for Jeremy Corbyn, it wasn’t on policy or on him as
an individual, it was the underhanded manner of 172 Labour MPs who decided as a
group that members didn’t matter and that they had the ‘right’ to get rid of a
duly elected leader.
Did the 172 Labour MPs who were part of what was termed by
some ‘the coup’ demonstrate leadership?
Did Labour member Michael Foster who went to court to knock
Jeremy Corbyn off the ballot paper was he demonstrating leadership?
At various levels of the Labour Party, post Corbyn victory
there have been calls for unity, but the reality is although there is talk to
unite the party, the party isn’t united, there isn’t a strategy all the way up
and down the line.
So, why is Eddie McAvoy, Labour leader of South Lanarkshire
breaking ranks with Glasgow, Aberdeen and Renfrewshire?
He and others decided on a course of action, remain united,
now it seems that the commitment to that concept appears to be deserting him.
In 2017, there are the council elections, after suffering
defeat after defeat, the Labour Party in some quarters appear to be planning
for defeat, which begs the question, what type of leadership is that being
demonstrated?
The phrase ‘managing expectations” is rather telling because
it suggests that an air of doom and gloom has entered their thinking, why
should people follow leaders who aren’t able to show leadership when the times
go bad?
A leader should be able to function even when circumstances
are adverse, it seems that some in the Labour Party think that getting elected
and kicked out is part and parcel of being on a merry go round, you wait to get
your turn.
In the past, the public were used to ping pong politics
between the two main parties, while ping pong politics flourished the real
losers were the public, with no real external competition no matter who got in
the people didn’t get a choice.
The election of Jeremy Corbyn has given people in the Labour
Party something that they haven’t had for some time, that thing is hope. Of
course winning the leadership of the Labour Party doesn’t mean or translate as
being able to win a General election. To win an election you have to have board
appeal which is why I want to mention Labour MP Diane Abbott, Abbott recently
decided to call Brexit voters ‘Bigots’.
Is Diane Abbott demonstrating leadership?
Is Diane Abbott demonstrating teamwork in that she is
promoting the party in the best possible light to future voters?
Stop a moment and think this through.
How did Diane Abbott ever get passed as a candidate to be an
MP?
If her comments were a one off, you might forgive and
forget, but she has a history of saying stupid things.
Here is an article relating to her conduct:
Diane Abbott ran for the Labour leadership in 2010,
the Membership marked her down as I recall Abbott was eliminated in the first
round of voting after securing 7.24% of votes.
Last night on Questiontime, the columnist Rod Liddle said
something rather stark about the leadership of the Labour Party, he said they
live in a ‘bubble’, and they don’t give a shit about anyone’s opinions other
than themselves. This is strong stuff, in Scotland, the Scottish Labour had to
find out the hard way at the ballot box what failing to deliver, failing to lead
actually meant, Westminster 2015 was the worst defeat in Scottish Labour
history, 2016; the public sent the Scottish Labour Party another message, the
worst defeat in the history of Holyrood.
We now have the Council elections of 2017 coming up, if you have
been reading the blog for some time, you will know prior to me joining the
Labour Party, I made a public commitment to stand as a candidate in the 2017
Council elections.
After doing a bit of research I decided to look into the
backgrounds of those who I maybe colleagues of if I get elected. I wouldn't
characterise some people as demonstrating leadership something I was failed
recently by the Labour Party selection.
Anyway I found this also:
Now, do I break a promise I publicly made to stand as a
candidate in this election, if anyone thinks the answer is yes, then clearly
they don’t know me or what leadership is.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
3 comments:
ARE you going to put a pay pal on mate to raise money to stand ?
Dear Anon
The cost of standing is free, if you get leaflets printed up you can get about 5,000 for about 100 quid, if you want to stand for best Westminster you need about £1200 to 1500 quid to make a decent go if it.
The big thing in campaigning is manpower and time to do the campaign right or at least to a professional standard.
Laying out a campaign is not that hard, the pre-planning sorts out the kinks, then you just have to work and grind your way through it on the doorstep and elsewhere.
Everything can be learned.
When I wasn't in 'politics' I thought such things were hard, when I got involved I found out that those at the 'top' are more or less disconnected from those on the ground which is why some parties have collasped in a real sense.
George
stick a pay pal up Georgeiboy I will spot you 50 quid
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