Ealing Southall
I’m supporting Virendra Sharma, the Labour candidate for Ealing Southall, in the by-election on 19 July. for more information about Virendra, go here.
To explain, this post comes very high in a Google search for “Ealing Southall”, so I edited it on 10 July 2007. The original post follows.
I don’t have anything to add to the eulogies to Mr Blair or the speculation about Mr Brown’s government, other than to say that when Brown was stood on the steps of Number 10, I felt as though I’d been holding my breath for a long time, and could finally exhale in relief. Blair’s remarks at PMQs were extraordinary, and my party will miss his eloquence and presence; hopefully we’ll find something more solid to replace it in Mr Brown.
So, instead, I’m going to blog about something else of interest to me. Along with hundreds of other party members, I get Ann Black’s NEC updates after every meeting. (There’s no truth in the rumour that Ann, as secretary of our CLP, gives a quiz to check who’s read them at the next GC, btw). This paragraph caught my eye:
Finally some members suggested reopening our decision that Ealing Southall should select its next parliamentary candidate from an all- women shortlist, following the sad death of sitting MP Piara Khabra. Traditionally, by-election candidates are chosen from open lists, a process which has overwhelmingly favoured men. However in this case, with the normal selection procedure imminent, and Piara Khabra’s own expressed wish that he should be succeeded by an ethnic minority woman, I hope that the NEC will keep its nerve or that we will at least have a chance to discuss any change.
Good, I thought. After all, our last female candidate is a winnable by-election was Catherine Stihler, in Dumfermline, last year. Before that, it was Judith Church, in Dagenham, in 1994. (Have a look at this list of by-elections, if you don’t believe me). It looks a bit bloody terrible for our party, so committed to equal representation that we changed the law to make it possible. And given that we’ve currently only two (and have only ever had three*) ethnic minority women in the House of Commons, perhaps getting a black or Asian woman selected for Ealing Southall might not be a bad idea?
Andrew, over at B4L, misses the point rather in his post. Yes, women don’t get selected because of direct discrimination, as Fawcett point out here (pdf) - but they also don’t get selected because of indirect discrimination - one might call it institutional discrimination, “the way that things have always been”. The practice of having “favoured sons”, groomed to take over from the sitting MP, is one of these ways of shutting out women. In by-elections, with a telescoped selection process, the pressure is on to select a safe pair of hands - and often that means going with the grain of the perception of who an MP usually is - white and male. It’s no coincidence that we’ve had a string of male candidates in by-elections, even if it’s not through the collective malevolence of procedures secretaries, and it’s about time we took a conscious decision to change that.
Yet today, in my MpURL (hideous thing - now the party can send me emails, emails and more emails to tell me to click onto their website to read emails - and do you say it M-P-U-R-L, or “empearl” or “empy-earl” or what?!), I got no fewer than seven invitations, sent at one minute intervals late this afternooon, by my old mucker Stephen Longdon of the constitutional unit, to apply for the Ealing Southall shortlist (BTW, 1. I’m not going to, and 2. I don’t think they were personal emails to me, somehow). Crucially, none included the information that men need not apply. What a missed opportunity, especially as we were going to make Ealing Southall AWS anyway. I hope one of the excellent Asian women who were gearing up to fight hard for that seat beat off the men who’ll no doubt flock to it, and for a second time in 13 years let us have a female candidate in a winnable by-election.
And yes, of course I think Sedgefield should be AWS too, before someone asks in the comments. I think every winnable seat should be AWS until the PLP is 50-50.
* Diane Abbot, Dawn Butler, Oona King. Only two at any one time, of course.
I agree. Labour should do this.
… they also don’t get selected because of indirect discrimination - one might call it institutional discrimination, “the way that things have always been”. The practice of having “favoured sons”, groomed to take over from the sitting MP, is one of these ways of shutting out women.
I don’t think I did miss the point: though I veiled my language somewhat, this is pretty much what I had in mind, and falls just as easily into the “discrimination” section as what you call direct discrimination. In short: neither form is acceptable - to me, anyway, and thus I still see these as attitudes to be tackled before we consider compounding the discrimination with AWS et al.
I don’t understand the point about a “safe pair of hands”: are you saying that selection panels etc. will apply that test, and if so, would that be based upon evidence that the electorate is sexist/racist/etc.? If that’s so, how likely is this to benefit a white male in a seat where a very large proportion of the population are not white? Are we saying that because the electorate as a whole is sexist/racist/etc., that the solution is not to challenge those attitudes first and foremost, but for selection panels to, essentially, force the electorate to have to vote for a non-white male candidate?
I think every winnable seat should be AWS until the PLP is 50-50.
I must say, I find that an alarming prospect. It doesn’t engage with any of the arguments about why different groups have different levels of interest in/commitment to politics, and it creates an open-ended and perhaps impossible commitment that may freeze half of all members from standing as candidates for who knows how long. That’ll create a huge amount of resistance.
Words of Wisdom…
Can’t fault this: The practice of having “favoured sons”, groomed to take over from the sitting MP, is one of these ways of shutting out women. Logical enough, that sons aren’t women….
AB: “I think every winnable seat should be AWS until the PLP is 50-50.”
B4L: “That’ll create a huge amount of resistance.”
Actually, I think it could create less resistance than the current policy. The current policy creates resistance not simply from people who are against positive discrimination, but also from people who think that HQ imposes AWS tactically, to stop specific men getting elected. Applying AWS indiscriminately in winnable seats until the balance of the PLP was 50-50 could increase the support for AWS in some sections of the party.
The only thing I would say is - is 50-50 necessarily the right balance? It seems to have a natural logic, given that roughly 50% of the population is female, half male and all that. But if it’s not just a cosmetic exercise & we’re serious about using parliament to get rid of sexism in wider society, wouldn’t it make sense to skew the PLP in favour of the section of the population which was more likely to make that a priority?
So perhaps 60-40, or even 70-30 might be better…
Antonia, while I am agreed with you on the idea of AWS in principle, I have to say that I am deeply uncomfortable about your attitude towards their application.
The idea of every winnable seat being AWS until the PLP is 50:50 is an idea that as a man, I am quite offended by the suggestion that such measures should be applied to that degree.
…wouldn’t it make sense to skew the PLP in favour of the section of the population which was more likely to make that a priority?
So wrong: illiberal, sexist (the assumption that only people of a certain - declared - gender are able to drive particular policies), patronising, arbitrary, divisive, and possibly (perhaps not, but it’s not that far-fetched) illegal. The more you try to solve one discriminatory practice with another, you extend compulsion, and by only achieving more rights for some at the expense of less for others, you foster resentment.
The problem for me with the above is the extent to which we’d start losing elections. I’ve supported AWS for a long time, but the presence of favoured sons isn’t the key problem - the absence of favoured daughters is.
Suggesting that people growing to selection within a constituency is a bad thing neglects one of the key reasons the Lib Dems have managed to take seats off us - candidates with a long-standing presence and a story to tell about their place in the local community.
“So wrong: illiberal, sexist (the assumption that only people of a certain - declared - gender are able to drive particular policies), patronising, arbitrary, divisive, and possibly (perhaps not, but it’s not that far-fetched) illegal. The more you try to solve one discriminatory practice with another, you extend compulsion, and by only achieving more rights for some at the expense of less for others, you foster resentment.”
I don’t mind being described as illiberal - in fact I’m tempted to take it as a compliment.
I don’t believe only people of a certain gender are able to drive particular policies. I do, however, believe people of a certain gender are more likely to drive particular politics. Why is that controversial? Would it be just as daft to believe working class people are more likely drive policies in working class interests, or rich people to drive policies in favour of the privleged? People are defined (or at least strongly influenced) by their experiences. Women are more likely to experience sexism. Women are therefore more likely to prioritise stopping sexism.
I’d rather trust in the probability that higher numbers of women in parliament means parliament is more likely to deal with problems that affect women disproportionately, than hope that the person who can lie best in selection hustings/who’s done the most social networking in their CLP happens to take those issues up when they get elected.
Tell me why that’s patronising or abritrary. To me it just seems realistic.
jdc - we could solve that problem by selecting candidates earlier and by year-round campaigning.
Tim I’m not talking about whether someone running in the 2009 (?) General Election was selected in 2006 or 2008, I’m talking about whether they’ve been a Councillor in the area before their selection, or a school governor, or grown up in the area, have friends there, family there.
It’s not an insurmountable obstacle, and I’m not saying that someone who doesn’t have those things won’t be a good MP, but they’ll be a weaker candidate in significant parts of the country - where I grew up I knew Labour voters who wouldn’t turn out if the Council candidate was from the wrong end of the Ward. A Parliamentary Candidate from London would have been the end of the world, whatever their gender.
As to year-round campaigning, nice aspiration. Generally, in my experience, easier to achieve if the candidate is someone rooted in the local area and of whose candidature the local members feel they have ownership.
also, and of course we’ll disagree on this precisely because it’s an illiberal argument, you only ever achieve “more rights for some at the expense of less for others”. For example, universal suffrage was achieved at the expense of no longer allowing men formal hegemony in representative politics.
Similarly, all practices are discriminatory. The question is whether it’s a form of discimination that props up an unjust, institutionally racist and patriarchal society - or one that challenges it.
The last comment was a response to B4L not jdc in case it wasn’t clear.
jdc, of course it’s an advantage to have lived all your life in an area you’re standing in, and have formed relationships with people. (Though I’ve known areas where candidates for council seats are known extremely well and have done badly as a result - because they are widely disliked by their community! But more important people want to see their candidate is committed to the area and I’m sure we can drive that impression home with a well-run three year campaign in any marginal whether the candidate is orginally from that area or not.
Yes, year round campaigning is more likely to happen with a candidate who is motivated and wildly popular with their party. But that’s only one of a number of factors, including hard-to-change variables like whether the members have broken hips which stop them from leafletting. The biggest factor is likely to be whether they have a full-time paid organiser.
Going back to the original point - women live in the areas they’ve grown up in just as much as men do. If there aren’t enough women who would be good in parliament in a given CLP, members should be out recruiting them. They might be more likely to do that if they knew they were getting an AWS.
“more importantly”, not “more important people want to see their candidate is committed to the area”
makes a substantial difference, and one is definitely more egalitarian!
[Tim]: For example, universal suffrage was achieved at the expense of no longer allowing men formal hegemony in representative politics.
Similarly, all practices are discriminatory. The question is whether it’s a form of discimination that props up an unjust, institutionally racist and patriarchal society - or one that challenges it.
One difference is that the legal framework is now more-or-less fair: you’ll have a job convincing the vast majority that they should give up their own rights to *equal treatment under the law* because some continue to characterise ours as an “unjust, institutionally racist and patriarchal” society, when there’s plenty of sociological evidence to explain differences in political participation among different groups in society.
As political lower-case liberals are goal should be to remove discrimination and let people make their own decisions as to whether they want to go into politics, not enforce an artifical 50-50 split (before moving on to further targets for other groups).
Without wishing to confuse the debate unnecessarily by also being called “Tim”, (a) I agree with almost everything Tim F has said, and (b) a few points in response to B4L’s latest comment:
One difference is that the legal framework is now more-or-less fair: you’ll have a job convincing the vast majority that they should give up their own rights to *equal treatment under the law* because some continue to characterise ours as an “unjust, institutionally racist and patriarchal” society, when there’s plenty of sociological evidence to explain differences in political participation among different groups in society.
There is wide support for AWS in the Labour Party, which is why it is Labour Party policy. Wd don’t have to convince anyone else. There is no legal right to be selected by the Labour Party for a safe seat.
As to whether something is legal, that is ultimately a second-order question: the primary question is what is right. As Martin Luther King was fond of pointing out, everything done in 1930s Germany was ‘legal’.
As political lower-case liberals
A liberal socialist is a boiling ice-cream. Either you believe in equality (not uniformity) of outcomes, or working towards that, and you are a socialist; or you believe in equality of process, or working towards that, and you are a liberal.
Judging by your views as here expressed, you are a sophisticated liberal on this issue. I’m not, neither’s Tim, and what’s more, as current policy shows, neither is the Labour Party.
our goal should be to remove discrimination
That should indeed be our goal. But discrimination, as Tim F makes clear above, is indirect (which you offer no overwhelmingly novel new ideas to address, though I accept John [jdc] makes some incisive points about the problems here) as well as direct.
As I see it, you propose, in essence, to remove direct discrimination and hope indirect discrimination goes away. I don’t think it will, and thus on balance I don’t think that that’s a good idea. I accept that all-one-sex-shortlists are deeply undesirable in principle: but the structure of our society is even more undesirable, and ultimately we choose the lesser of those two evils.
and let people make their own decisions as to whether they want to go into politics,
Andrew, I read a lot of your stuff, and you are quite clever enough to know very well that people do not make decisions in a vacuum.
The decisions people make and the choices they conceptualize are shaped to a significant degree, differing from person to person, by the upbringing they had, their educational opportunities, and the resources they have.
They are even, to differing degrees and in very different ways, shaped by their genetic heritage. I would, for example, dearly love to be able to fly a light aircraft. I never will, because I have a congenital defect which means I cannot possibly be allowed to fly a plane: I’m deuteranopic.
At the most basic level, people with more resources are more likely to have time to spare to get interested in controlling political power. Men have, on average, more pay and more resources in our society. They therefore are more likely to have time to devote to politics.
What’s more, most current politicians are male, which shapes the societal expectations for rising generations of what sorts of people become politicians (less so for the university-educated population, but most of the population isn’t university-educated).
not enforce an artifical 50-50 split
50:50 isn’t artificial, it’s the ratio (roughly) of men to women in our society. Politics is about the exercise of power in our society, and you’d expect, in an ideal world, that people would make decisions as to whether they went into politics in a manner totally independent of their sex, just as MPs have a range of hair colour broadly representative of the world outside the Commons, because we live in a world where there is not systematic discrimination against a group of people on the basis of their hair colour.
The clear reality is that that isn’t the case, and there are some entrenched problems. It would be nice if there weren’t, but there are.
You’re perfectly numerate and can do the maths yourself, but using the normal as an approximation to the binomial, you can surely see that there’s a pretty systemic problem when we only have a hundred-odd women MPs out of 650-odd.
I do actually agree with Tim on this - that there is a strong representation for over-representation of women in the PLP relative to broader society.
Our party is at its best when it remembers the traditions on which it was founded and looks, again and again, to the least powerful group in our society and seeks to give them not just a greater voice, not just greater opportunity, not just greater wealth, but greater power.
In 1900 that was the industrialized working classes and only men could be got into Parliament.
In 2007, it means women, and above all, disabled women, women from ethnic minorities, young women, and lesbian women.
Women remain oppressed in our society: not every individual woman is oppressed, and most men are not individually oppressive. But there is such a thing as society and it has set up and continues to perpetuate a world where women work harder and get paid less for doing the same jobs.
Like Tim F, I would like to see the Labour Party have 60 to 70% AWS (I accept there are disadvantages to AWS which is why I’m not actually in favour of 100% AWS), and I’d like to see 20% plus of those vacancies going to BME candidates.
Having said that, I have deep reservations about using the AWS model as way to achieve the BME target. For AWS, identifying who is and who is not a woman is ususally (though I accept not always, either because people are transsexual or because of [say] Turner syndrome).
For improving BME representation it is however much more difficult. I was trained as a biological scientist, and that scientist rebels, after Lewontin’s famous 1972 paper, against the notion of any genetic basis to race - AWF Edwards’ 2005 attack on Lewontin’s results and data, repeated by Dawkins in his ‘Ancestors Tale’ book, is interesting and technically partially correct but flawed by an inadequate understanding of the asymmetry of the burden of proof in taxonomic method.
In consequence the analysis of ethnicity in society has of necessity to be a curious hybrid of ancestry, appearance and sociology, tempered too by an appreciation of the ‘differential racism’ of our society.
By ‘differential racism’ I mean the reality that White Irish kids tend to have a slightly less unpleasant experience, by and large, of the institutional racism of the British state than (say) Black British kids or (for a group who get a truly appalling deal from the system) Roma kids.
Should anyone be daft enough to dispute that BME communities are heterogeneous with respect to the racism (direct and indirect) that they suffer, educational statistics from DCSF should be sufficient to make this point.
But Irish can count as BME in a Labour Party selection, just as Turkish or Nigerian. We’ve just gone through an AWS selection in my own CLP where one of the candidates did exactly that.
“Self-definition”, the usual answer to these problems, is therefore rather problematic - especially so as so much of people’s perception of race is tied to skin hue which can vary so much even within families.
My sister and I, for example, share all our ancestors, yet she is substantially darker-skinned and is frequently asked what nationality she is. No one ever guesses I’m not classical White British: she gets racism from unpleasant old ladies and naive university lecturers.
Since I can’t help thinking that an approach to all BME shortlists which put full brothers and sisters in separate categories would be one based solely on the colour of one’s skin, and since I think shortlisting based on comparing the light absorbency of people’s epidermis is going to be pretty problematic to sell to the Party, the notion of all BME shortlists as aired by politicians like David Lammy fills me with an array of technical concerns about how would they work, despite a basic deep sympathy.
But that is, I suppose, another point, and I hope you will forgive the digression.
Tim, I think you may be over-complicating the case against all BME shorlists. Of course, self-definition would be the only way to get round some of the problems you identify - but anyone self-defining as BME who was (for example) a white British person with white British parents would undoubtedly create an impression that s/he was trying to cheat the system, fostering resentment towards that person and making them less likely to win. Furthermore, the principle of having BME shortlists would likely encourage more BME people to step forwards, and even if it resulted in (say) 2 white Irish people and 6 otherwise BME people being on a particular list, that would still be a healthier balance of candidates and make the selection of a BME candidate more likely.
Women do not make good mp’s.Most come in not because of their talent but because they are WOMEN,and they are elected to represent their constituents both female and male.However,once their feet are under the table they revert to type
and represent only women.
Men are discriminated against,quite openly by some
in all walks of life now and you would think that
some aspiring politician would open up these issues for which there has been no debate in the public arena at all and no air or media support.
It is evident that this is a game plan.
If this country is turning away from democracy
in favour of a gynarchy it would be honest of these female politicians to say so.
It would be helpful if someone could answer the following questions:
1) How many and what % ethnic minority MPs do we have in the Commons? [compare this number and % to women).
2) How many and what % ethnic minority MPs do we have from London? Around 30% of the population is ethnic minority
3) I think the % of women MPs representing Labour in the London region is around 37.6% (Labour has a target of 40%) Why is there no target for ethnic minorities?
4) Who agrees that the lower level of ethnic minority representation is a HIGHER priority than women representation, especially in Ealing Southall?
from the Labour Party stands
foolish troll
Gurjeet - we currently have 15 BME MPs - 2%. I agree with you that increasing black representation is an absolute priority, but it’s really unhelpful to play off black and women’s representation against one another. I’d like more black women in Parliament, please - and Ealing Southall should stay AWS.
Let’s have two BME women PPCs in these seats. Definitely two women candidates. If one or two could be gay and reformist communist even better. I am serious. We need to take these opportunities. We should stop some right wing arse who’s on a promise getting Sedge-rotton-borough-field.
Though if Sedgefield are allowed to select a McDonnellite white male I’d accept that too … but he should defer to his wife or mistress really.
Antonia you wrote:
Gurjeet - we currently have 15 BME MPs - 2%. I agree with you that increasing black representation is an absolute priority, but it’s really unhelpful to play off black and women’s representation against one another. I’d like more black women in Parliament, please - and Ealing Southall should stay AWS.
To get fair representation the first priority should be more ethnic minorities, the second priority should be to get more women. If we can get more ethnic minority women elected this meets both priorities. However, the 10-year AWS experience for ethnic minorities (women and men has not been good) - nearly always a non-white woman has been selected. Hence, open selection is preferred in constituencies with large ethnic minorities.
See link to BBC article below, not sure if AWS has produced an ethnic minority MP.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4054429.stm
As you have probably heard the Ealing Southall selection is open.
Do those who support AWS (as I do) also support all ethnic minority short lists. The current Labour Party chair supports AWS, but not sure about the other. See link below:
http://www.blink.org.uk/pdescription.asp?key=15082&grp=66&cat=217
Also how can the Labour Party defend having a target of 40% for women MPs, but no target for ethnic minorities?
I think they’re investigating the legal implications of BME shortlists at the moment so hopefully we’ll have a proposal on it soon. They may need to change the law to allow it.
It should’ve been done a while back, fair enough, but at least there’s some movement on it now.
Given Equal Opportunities and Race Relations legislation that has been around for decades - investigating the legal implications of BME shortlists in 2007 seems odd to say the least if we have managed AWS some 10 years ago. You would have thought someone with equality and fairness in mind at the Labour HQ would have looked at this. Then again the Labour NEC currently has no ethnic minority representation!
Perhaps the Labour Party should voluntarily adopt the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000 that introduced a positive duty on 40,000 public bodies to promote race equality. I think political parties are not covered by this legislation. This could help with membership drives as well as better representation.
Also in London i think there are only 2 ethnic minority MPs out of 44 (4.5%) - there were 3 before Piara Khabra passed away, whereas the estimated ethnic minority population in London is now probably almost a third following the demographic changes since the Census in 2011.
If you go by the current rate of progress (over the last 20 years) it will take hundreds of years before ethnic minorities are properly represented as MPs in the Labour Party in London. I’m afraid this is just not good enough.
More also needs to be done on the gender issue, but the current rate of progress (over the last 20 years) shows women could be properly represented as MPs in the Labour Party in London possibly in the next General Election.
Incidentally there are no ethnic minority MPs for any other political party in London to make the situation even worse if we look at how the Commons represents London’s population.
Gurjeet - Women comprise 28 per cent of all Labour MPs, an increase of 5 percentage points from 2001. At this rate, it’ll take another 20 years to get equal representation in the PLP, so I don’t want to take our foot off the accelerator.
No-one here disagrees with you about getting more BME MPs (though your focus on London in particular is odd - I’d like women and BME MPs spread around the country, please!). The party clearly hasn’t responded quickly enough to get more BME MPs, and I’m not content to see extra training and support alone - our experience with getting women into parliament shows that this doesn’t make the crucial difference. I support all BME shortlists, but as Ealing Southall was due to be AWS, it should stay that way.
I agree we should not take the foot off as regards getting more women MPs.
In the Labour Party context looking at what each region is doing to get fairer representation is important. I suspect the London region is doing better than most in getting more woman MPs, but more needs to be done.
However, as women are fairly evenly distributed throughout the country it would be reasonable to expect there should not be big differences between regions. If anyone has regional figures on current gender representation it would be useful to the debate.
The situation as regards the demographics of ethnic minorities is much more complicated. London and other major cities is where most ethnic minorities live. Rural areas have far fewer ethnic minorities. It would therefore seem sensible for regions, such as London, where around a third may be ethnic minorities to set higher targets than some other regions.
As Ealing Southall is in London and has a large ethnic minority population this is why the original decision by the NEC in March 2007 for AWS, against the advise of the London region and a petition of local Labour Party members in Ealing Southall has to date proved divisive.
The by election and split AWS has caused in the local Labour Party has been what has led the Labour HQ to now make it a open process.
I hope Labour will select a candidate on Wednesday that will unite the local Labour Party that will allow any opposition from the Liberal Democrats to be seen off. We wait and see if the (terrible) selection by the Conservatives is better news for Labour or the Liberal Democrats.
Out of interest Gurjeet can you please point me at a good summary of how bad this Tony Lit character is?
Worse and worse, Gurjeet. I’m utterly infuriated that the NEC has backtracked on a contentious decision to have an AWS in Ealing - it encourages other CLPs to think that if they protest hard enough, there’s a chance the decision could be reveresed. We either do this, or we don’t - we mustn’t endup in the halfway house of letting CLPs think that measures agreed by conference to enforce equality shouldn’t apply to them. More than ever, I hope they select a great Asian woman.
I’m going to sound like a broken record, and on balance I think if the next election is being AWS in a seat then all else being equal a by-election should be too. However, one note of caution - it was easy to ignore / forget the Peter Law mess-up. That was Wales, all sorts of odd things happen in Wales.
If something like that happened in a prominent seat, and it split the vote and let in not an Independent but a Tory or a Lib Dem (or, as I theorised the other day, worse, in e.g. Barking), it could bring the whole concept of AWS into disrepute - since I think all but the most feminist in the Labour Party would rather have 350 Labour MPs who are 80% male than 250 Labour MPs who are 50% male. A case for winning one battle at a time, I think.
Chris Paul wrote:
Out of interest Gurjeet can you please point me at a good summary of how bad this Tony Lit character is?
Suggest you may want to read what Conservatives have been writing about him
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=62…717779155270974
“However, as women are fairly evenly distributed throughout the country it would be reasonable to expect there should not be big differences between regions. If anyone has regional figures on current gender representation it would be useful to the debate”
If I’ve countee correctly, here’s the distribution of Labour female MPs throughout the various regions:
East Midlands: 7 women out of 25 Lab MPs (32.5%)
Eastern: 4 out of 13 (30.76%)
London: 16 out of 44 (36.36%)
North East: 6 out of 28 (21.42%)
North West: 19 out of 61 (31.14%)
Scotland: 7 out of 40 (17.5%)
South East: 5 out of 19 (26.31%)
South West: 5 out of 13 (38.46%)
Wales: 7 out of 29 (24.13%)
West Midlands: 8 out of 38 (21.05%)
Yorkshire: 12 out of 44 (27.27%)
As North East is low compared to the Labour HQ target of 40%, surely Labour should be either pushing AWS or at least to select a woman in Sedgefield. At the moment the only names being mentioned are all men.
Thanks Gurjeet
I found Unity’s anthology of Tory comments and have now blogged it myself here.
Best w
Chris P
“As North East is low compared to the Labour HQ target of 40%, surely Labour should be either pushing AWS or at least to select a woman in Sedgefield.”
yes, North East has few Labour female MPs. And for next GE they have decided on AWS for Washington and Sunderland West (but it won’t increase Labour women in the area as it would just compensate for Sharon Hodgson MP losing the selection battle for next door Gateshead against David Clelland MP), but the NEC gave an open shortlist to Easington (next door to Sedgefield and one of the safest Labour seats in the country)
Double standards in Easington. This shows Labour HQ is struggling in some areas to meet the 40% target, no wonder they have not agreed a target for ethnic minorities!
Reference to Ealing Southall in The Sunday Times
July 1, 2007
What do you think of what Geiffrey Robinson had to say?
I saw a nasty case of KKK Tourette’s at first hand last week when I was in a Five Live discussion with Gordon Brown’s friend and mentor, Geoffrey Robinson MP. He had been talking, perfectly reasonably, about Labour’s forthcoming by-elections. And then he had a sort of seizure. “We’ll be fine,” he said, “so long as we don’t choose a white candidate in Ealing Southall and a black in Sedgefield.”
Suddenly realising what had issued from his mouth, he looked embarrassed, as if he had just passed wind in front of the Queen. “Well, ah, um, let me be clear,” he bumbled in desperation, “we’ll be fine with a candidate of any colour, creed, race or gender…”
Hope it’s not too late, Geoff. Next time you hear a politician suddenly announce he doesn’t like darkies, or he bets Rosa Parks never bought a ticket for that bus, you’ll know what it is: KKK Tourette’s.
Something V Sharma (not registed) has posted elsewhere
http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/guide/seat-profiles/ealingsouthall#comment-21094
Story of one of the Ealing Southall hopefuls
Model sues politician over assault allegation
A young model has submitted a claim against a Labour councillor who is accused of having her arrested days before her university dissertation was due to be handed in.
Cllr Jasbir Anand (Lab, Southall Green) is accused of defaming insurance broker Natasha Tah after reporting her to police last year.
Cllr Anand, a hopeful to take over as Ealing and Southall MP at the next General Election, told police that Natasha, of Uxbridge Road, Southall, assaulted her in the street in April last year.
Natasha was investigated by police for three months before the case was thrown out by the Crown Prosecution Service.
Speaking exclusively to the Ealing Times - sister paper of Local London - in March, Natasha told how being arrested four days before she was due to hand in her dissertation “totally affected” her university performance.
The claim against Cllr Anand was issued on April 11 and is currently awaiting confirmation of receipt from Cllr Anand’s solicitors.
Natasha’s solicitor David Sheahan said he was confident in the strength of the case.
He said: “How it works is we get a report leaving all the names out - except for our client’s - and the other solicitors get the same but with their client’s name.
“When we put the two reports together we will get the complete picture. In my opinion Anand is going to find it difficult to justify her allegations in light of that report.”
Cllr Anand said she and her solicitors would not be commenting on the case at this time.
5:57am Sunday 3rd June 2007
By David Doyle
Verendra Sharma
Jo Sidhu
No turbaned Sikhs, no women - just not good enough a short list for the local Labour Party members.
Just seen the following on another blog
The following was posted yesterday by the Sikh Federation (UK) on http://www.sikhsangat.com. The Federation appear to be equally shocked on no turban wearing Sikh or women in the short list. This would have been the way forward to let local Labour Party members decide.
The Sikh Federation (UK) was aware that a certain element within the Labour Party and locally may look to exclude turbaned wearing Sikhs. With this in mind the following press statement was put out early this morning.
WILL LABOUR ALLOW FIRST TURBANED SIKH IN THE COMMONS
Two weeks ago following the death of Ealing Southall MP, Piara Khabra the Labour Party was initially all set to adopt an all women’s short list with the likely winner being Sonika Nirwal. However, considering this is a by election that Gordon Brown dare not lose the selection process was opened up last week to avoid a major rift in the local Labour Party.
Last night (Monday 2 July) the Labour Selection Panel is understood to have reduced the number of applicants for this safe Labour seat from around 150 to around ten local candidates. The biggest lobby has come from the Sikh community to try and get the first turbaned Sikh elected to the Commons. It is understood two of the ten are turbaned Sikhs, including Gurcharan Singh who is widely accepted as the person with most support in the local Labour Party.
After carrying out interviews the Labour Selection Panel will today (Tuesday 3 July) name the candidates that will be on the short list to take part in hustings this evening and to be put to local Labour Party members tomorrow (Wednesday 4 July). If Gurcharan Singh’s name is one of those on the short list he has a huge vote bank amongst local Labour Party members and is likely to win hands down. However, if he fails to make the short list where will this leave Labour MPs, including Ministers, who have given a commitment to see a turbaned Sikh in Parliament.
A Sikh Federation (UK) spokesman said: ‘If the Labour Party decide not to put a turbaned Sikh in the short list for Ealing Southall the community will have to think carefully about its support for the Party not just in Southall but throughout the UK.’
The next MP for Ealing Southall will in effect be decided by who Labour selects. It appears that excellent turbaned Sikh candidates, such as Dr Harkirtan Singh and Gurinder Singh, have been excluded from the long list on the basis they are not local. However, it is widely rumoured that soon after Piara Khabra’s death the Labour Party had already decided that it wanted Sonika Nirwal as their candidate and it was easier to justify her selection if the long list was restricted to local candidates. The open selection process appears to have been put in place to simply show a certain amount of fairness and transparency.
If Labour fail to allow a turbaned Sikh to be in the short list they are in real danger of giving up the seat to the Liberal Democrats as they will benefit most from an anti-Labour Muslim vote and Sikhs who will feel deeply offended that a well supported and local Sikh has been excluded simply as he has a turban that does not fit the new Labour image.
Gurjeet Singh
National Press Secretary
Sikh Federation (UK)
The news earlier today that only two have been short listed - Verendra Sharma and Jo Sidhu has nonetheless come as a shock. Not only have turbaned Sikhs been overlooked, but women have also been excluded, including the favourite Sonika Nirwal. Some are suggesting Verendra Sharma will be an easy winner of the Labour selection process tomorrow - locals may wish to comment.
The BIGGER question is how should Sikhs vote in the by election on 19 July. Will there be an independent standing as the Labour Party has let many down through the selection process.
04 July, 2007 06:50
Another post on Sikh Sangat
I hope Gurcharan Singh stands as an independent or if he doesn’t then another Turbanned Sikh stands for this seat and Gurcharan Singh can ‘unofficially’ give his support for the candidate. Labour have badly let down the Sikhs again, how long are we going to let us be betrayed every time. First Khabra is imposed on the Sikhs and we get 15 years of a near comatose MP representing us. Brown has just appointed TWO Muslims as ministers and yet we Sikhs can’t even get a Turbanned Sikh into parliament. How many times have we shouted hoarse that Sikhs need to be more visible in the UK and how much we are suffering from being misidentified as Muslims. ONLY a TURBANNED Sikh in parliament can give us a high profile. After the recent terror attacks by Muslims in the UK getting a turbanned Sikh in parliament has become even more important. If Gurcharan Singh stands he can rely on the votes of at least 10 electors who are members of my extended family and I would definately work to get as many people as possible to vote for him.
04 July, 2007 06:51
PRESS RELEASE
Thursday 5 July 2007
LABOUR PARTY MEMBERS - SIKHS, WOMEN AND YOUNG PEOPLE NOT IMPRESSED BY LABOUR SELECTION PROCESS FOR EALING SOUTHALL BY ELECTION
Around two weeks ago following the death of Piara Khabra, the MP for Ealing Southall, the race began for who would be the Labour Party candidate in the by election on 19 July. Last night it was confirmed the Labour candidate would be Cllr Virendra Sharma after the Labour Selection Panel, including Keith Vaz MP and Tom Watson MP decided on a remarkably short list, of two men on Tuesday afternoon. It is reported that fellow Labour MPs like Fiona Mactaggart were furious with the outcome and made their views known with the new Party Chair, Harriet Harman.
The Labour Party had already announced in March that it would adopt an all women’s short list with the front runner being Sonika Nirwal. However, as this was a by election and a candidate for Ealing Southall had yet to be announced to replace Piara Khabra, when he stepped down, his untimely death provided the Labour Party with an opportunity to open up the selection process.
The Labour Selection Panel reduced the estimated number of applicants for this safe Labour seat from perhaps as many as 100 to eight candidates on Monday evening. Publicly there were two fairly powerful lobbies – one to ensure a woman was selected and the other to get a Sikh into the Commons, preferably a turban wearing Sikh.
It is understood two of the eight on the long list were women – Sonika Nirwal and Jasbir Anand. Seven of the eight were Sikh, with three turban wearing Sikhs, including Cllr Gurcharan Singh who was widely acknowledged as the person with most support within the local Labour Party membership that would ultimately determine who represented them. Most, but not all, on the long list were local candidates. As there were candidates on the long list that were not local some are asking why excellent candidates, like Dr Harkirtan Singh, who has been short listed before in Denton and Reddish, were excluded on this occasion.
After interviews on Tuesday the Labour Selection Panel surprisingly only named two on the short list to take part in hustings that evening and who would be put to the local Labour Party membership. The hustings on Tuesday night were only for local Labour Party members and reports suggest they proved quite tense as there were many who were upset at the short list. The absence of a woman or turban wearing Sikh in the short list were two of the main concerns.
It has been reported that the Selection Panel wanted somebody similar to the Conservative candidate Tony Lit – “an Asian man with a ‘clean cut’ image”. However, it is been unofficially suggested that part of the thinking was that Sonika Nirwal and Gurcharan Singh had some sort of skeletons in the cupboard that the opposition parties might exploit in the by election. Similar allegations could be made against the candidate selected, but only time will tell what tactics and information the opposition parties use. It is interesting that Labour has chosen to keep media coverage of its chosen candidate very quiet.
As Labour has failed to allow a woman or turbaned Sikh to be in the short list there is a risk that an independent Labour candidate will now stand. Labour has brought this on itself. It has also not been lost on the Sikh community in Ealing Southall and throughout the UK that young Sikh professionals have been overlooked for the one ageing non-Sikh on the long list.
Gurjeet Singh
National Press Secretary
Sikh Federation (UK)
There is only one female candidate out of the fifteen selected for the Sedgefield and Ealing by-elections. Obviously I have an interest in pointing out that she is Sarah Edwards (Green).
Matt
Heard there was a meeting in Southall last night where several independent Sikh candidates got together to ‘elect’ their ‘official’ candidate, even though all their names will be on the ballot paper.
Apparently, it was agreed by the majority that a Dr Jasdev Singh Rai, who heads up some local human rights group, would be the candidate with the best chance of winning.
Dr Rai apparently said ‘if the only reason for standing was to split the Labour vote and cause Sharma to lose then he was not interested because he is in it to win it.’
Anyone that understands politics and the Ealing Southall situation know at best he will get a few thousand votes that may influence the final outcome.
Gurjeet -
Get over yourself. There is no call to stoop to the tactics of Peter Law, and the priority now is to get another ethnic minority Labour MP, Virendra Sharma, elected.
Have made a few enquiries about this Dr Rai. My Sikh friends say he is an opportunist that many do not trust. He will no doubt play the Sikh card. But local Gurdwaras do not like him and no way will Sikhs support him enmasse.
Even the Sikh Federation (UK) who has been active on these blogs more often than not do not see eye to eye with him. In fact some of my Sikh friends suggest they detest each other.
Upon further digging it emerges Dr Jasdev Singh Rai not only heads up a human rights group - Sikh Human Rights Group (SHRG), he also headed up a terrorist Khalistani organisation - the International Sikh Youth Federation (ISYF) in the late 1980s. In fact some have confirmed the original name of the human rights group was Sikh Human Rights Group (ISYF) as it was the ISYF’s human rights wing.
During his time in the ISYF people in Southall and west London will remember a few of its members were imprisoned for a very long time for ‘taking out’ political opponents. Hopefully, he will not resort to these tactics in Ealing Southall, even though it will be dirty!
If the media and my name sake look into this I can see him pulling out, which must do Labour some good.
The local police and Special Branch no doubt know him well and will keep an eye on him and his supporters!
I would like to see politicians pay and expenses pared very sharply in line with the national wage.
We might then have representatives who actually believe they can benefit the electorate and stand up for peoples rights rather than toeing a party line or standing on a false agenda.We do not need more women or sikhs.We need people from all walks of life who are honest and commensensical.
We will finish up with,if we haven’t already, a group of politicians who are very mediocre and highly anxious to join this illegal “gravy train”
Michael… just how exactly would you get representatives from all walks of life if they are paid minimum wage, and not given the money required to run their offices. How would you attract more parents, or working class candidates, if they find that to become an MP would be to leave themselves bankrupt.Being an MP is not cheap - one must maintain housing in two places at once, just to start off with; two mortgages on minimum wage doesn’t sound particularly tenable to me.
Given the working hours and demands on an MP’s time and life, I think we have just about the right balance at the moment - what we need to do is beef up the pay of local councillors, to make that more attractive from people of all walks of life, rather than, as on some councils, a retirement hobby.
Virendra Sharma has a record of only turning up for about one in three council meetings. What can he offer if he doesn’t even show up?
My vote’s with Nigel Bakhai of the Lib Dems. He’s got an excellent record for speaking at meetings in Ealing and Hanwell.