Dear All
In politics it is helpful if you have a public profile, as
the old saying goes can’t do any harm.
Recently, Mary Lockhart was elected to public office as Scottish
Labour Councillor in a recent by-election, at the time; some people questioned
her choice as candidate as she had been a pro-independence supporter.
Now, the new elected Councillor hits the headlines, not on
the issue of independence but because of a Facebook post said to likening party
officials to Nazis. The decision for her hard hitting post was due to what some
people call ‘the purge’.
Not as in the movie, but a more gentler purge, suspend
people’s membership which would make them ineligible to vote in the leadership
election. A lot of people have voiced opinion on ‘the purge’ and it has created
a lot of anger in the party as accustaions fly back and forward.
The contest between Jeremy Corbyn and Owen Smith isn’t a
great one, from the start it started off very nasty and that is how it will
end, Jeremy Corbyn is on course to win, although he says that he will work with
people in the PLP, you can expect his crew not to. The contest was a bad idea
but it went ahead, the right of the Labour Party expected Corbyn to resign when
the PLP did their famous drip drip drip of resignations.
That backfired spectacularly.
Angela Eagle said she was a strong labour woman then promptly
abandoned her campaign making accusations which probably will not be forgotten
or forgiven by her CLP.
The contest is over, the next order of business is
de-selection, it is right that the people who are elected should face a
challenge at very election whether they be Councillor, MSP or MP.
No one should have a job for life, it is undemocratic.
Apparently some people feel that this is wrong that an MP
should have to be selected at every election, I don’t, who represents an area
should be decided by the membership of the party who are living in that area.
Anyway back to Mary Lockhart, her post on Facebook used the famous
poem by Pastor Martin Niemöller about Nazis persecution.
Apparently she is protesting a decision to ban a number of
Labour members from voting which led to her saying:
“Who will they expel next? I have friends who are genuinely
fearful!”
Is being banned or suspended a really big deal?
Well, if you look at it in context during an election, the answer
is yes, there is actually such a thing as the Labour Party compliance unit,
this is a bunch of people who investigate alleged wrongdoing and then come to a
decision on whether or not there is a case for taking it further to some sort
of hearing.
Check it out here, the money is pretty decent from where I
sit and wades in at £34,061.77 with an annual fixed sum allowance of £1003 per
annum.
And given the size of the party and some of the elements in
it, you might have a pretty busy time of it but on the other side of the coin;
you will meet a hell of a lot of people.
Mary Lockhart posted:
"First they came for the Socialists, and I did not
speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak
out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for
me."
I take it that ‘them’ in this case would be a visit by the Compliance
Officers who will probably say get that post ripped down and don’t be so stupid
in future. If she had named anyone by name, she might be on a sticky wicket for
a disciplinary perhaps as she would have to justify her comments.
Scottish Labour said that the comparison was “unacceptable”.
Scottish Conservative MSP Murdo Fraser said:
"It shows just how much of a state the Labour is in
when newly elected councillors are suggesting colleagues are Nazis."
A Lib Dem spokesman said:
most people manage to resolve arguments without elected
officials comparing apparatchiks to the Nazis".
A Scottish Labour spokesman said:
"This kind of comparison is unacceptable. All elected
representatives and party members have a duty to conduct themselves in an
appropriate manner."
Lockhart has since apologised
for any offence caused.
In a statement, she said:
"I have found Pastor Neimoller’s most widely quoted
poem inspiring since I first encountered it when the Rector of my school used
it as a text on which to base his address at a school assembly. It is, in my
view, a poem about having the courage to speak up for others experiencing
adversity, whether you agree with their views or not, and it seems to me to
underline some of the fundamental values of the Labour Party, namely
solidarity. “In posting it on Facebook, I had no intention of implying
that suspensions or expulsions from the Labour Party were comparable to the
Holocaust, or to the deliberate extermination of Jewish people, Lutherans,
disabled people, and homosexuals which cast a long shadow over the 20th Century
and beyond. I am deeply sorry if the post, in solidarity with a friend whose
membership has been suspended, was interpreted as making such a comparison”.
When elected to public office, Scottish Labour deputy leader
Alex Rowley hailed Mary Lockhart getting in as a “watershed moment” for Labour
to field an openly pro-independence candidate.
I guess he won’t be ‘hailing’ very much about this episode.
Finally, if you have an eye for detail, and like investigations, then compliance officer might just be the job for you.
Yours sincerely
George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University
YOU really couldn't make it up
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