Progress, which favours professionalising the Labour Party, held a surprising seminar today with the above title. It deserves to be discussed since Parliament is packed with lawyers, accountants, businessmen, PR executives, academics, ex-Students Union careerists, and men (the vast majority white) – but extremely few representatives of the working class. Since 57% of people, according to one recent poll, self-label themselves ‘working class’, yet of the 650 MPs little more than 5% come from these origins – virtually none in the Tory parliamentary party and less than 10% in the PLP – class misrepresentation in the seat of government is quite an issue which should be addressed. Labour has tried to counter the paucity of women by all-women shortlists, but what about the far greater paucity of working-class activists?
If Labour is to take this seriously, 4 main reforms are needed. First, in the nominating process ward parties and affiliated bodies should interview parliamentary candidates face-to-face and not via CVs alone, which extraordinarily was the case till very recently. Second, the panel from the CLP Executive tasked with drawing up the shortlist should include at least one-third women and one-third drawn from trade union representatives. Third, those candidates chosen for the final shortlist, which should normally number 6 to ensure a reasonable range of choice, should similarly be at least one-third women and at least one-third working class, as judged by their current job. Finally, those entitled to attend the final selection conference should include all members within the constituency, both affiliated members as well as fully signed-up party members. Nor is this a particularly novel or radical suggestion as affiliated members already elect the party Leader and the Mayor of London.
Even this would not entirely eliminate the advantage of those who have well-off parents who can fund them, networks and social contacts who can open doors, and a job which allows them to take time off to canvass and make their presence felt around the constituency. Perhaps one further rule which might assist a level playing-field is a limit, a fairly low limit, on what a person can spend to promote their candidacy, with the deterrent that if they over-spend, they could be disqualified.
This is not an esoteric or arcane matter. If Labour doesn’t significantly change the composition of the PLP, then it will not regain its core support in the D and E classes who deserted the party in droves at the 2010 election because they felt that Labour no longer represented them. But it would be equally wrong to think that this exercise is simply about getting more working class activists into Parliament. It’s more than that. It’s about training tomorrow’s leaders from all sections of society and making sure they have an equal chance of achieving the role of MPin a manner that does credit both to their party and to their country.
If Labour is to take this seriously, 4 main reforms are needed. First, in the nominating process ward parties and affiliated bodies should interview parliamentary candidates face-to-face and not via CVs alone, which extraordinarily was the case till very recently. Second, the panel from the CLP Executive tasked with drawing up the shortlist should include at least one-third women and one-third drawn from trade union representatives. Third, those candidates chosen for the final shortlist, which should normally number 6 to ensure a reasonable range of choice, should similarly be at least one-third women and at least one-third working class, as judged by their current job. Finally, those entitled to attend the final selection conference should include all members within the constituency, both affiliated members as well as fully signed-up party members. Nor is this a particularly novel or radical suggestion as affiliated members already elect the party Leader and the Mayor of London.
Even this would not entirely eliminate the advantage of those who have well-off parents who can fund them, networks and social contacts who can open doors, and a job which allows them to take time off to canvass and make their presence felt around the constituency. Perhaps one further rule which might assist a level playing-field is a limit, a fairly low limit, on what a person can spend to promote their candidacy, with the deterrent that if they over-spend, they could be disqualified.
This is not an esoteric or arcane matter. If Labour doesn’t significantly change the composition of the PLP, then it will not regain its core support in the D and E classes who deserted the party in droves at the 2010 election because they felt that Labour no longer represented them. But it would be equally wrong to think that this exercise is simply about getting more working class activists into Parliament. It’s more than that. It’s about training tomorrow’s leaders from all sections of society and making sure they have an equal chance of achieving the role of MPin a manner that does credit both to their party and to their country.
