With nominations by CLPs (constituency Labour parties) closing massively in favour of their left-supported rivals, CAC candidates Michael Cashman and Gloria de Piero – who are supported by hard-right Labour factions Progress and Labour First – decided incongruously to change tack with their campaign by re-packaging themselves as champions of the rank and file membership of the party.
Incongruously because they presided last year, along with their fellow CAC members, over decisions facilitating a rule-change that added two unelected, anti-Corbyn members to the party’s National Executive Committee – a move that dismayed Labour’s massively pro-Corbyn membership and involved ignoring the views of those who opposed it and the methods used to achieve it at last year’s annual Conference.
In spite of that, Mr Cashman’s recent campaign statement claimed he was all about making sure “the views of ordinary members are heard”:
It was an interesting move, to say the least. But it didn’t take too long for Mr Cashman to make clear that the views of some Labour members are more equal than others.
Left-wing magazine Red Pepper published an article that lists – entirely accurately, from a perusal of his Twitter feed – a set of statements made by Mr Cashman concerning Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and his supporters – supporters who make up the vast majority of the ‘ordinary Labour members’ Cashman claims he wants to help be heard, including calling them ‘deluded’.
Many, probably most, of those members would voice firm agreement with the Pepper’s conclusion that his comments regarding Corbyn and his supporters undermine his campaign claim about ensuring their voices are heard.
Fair political comment, you’d think – and certainly nothing harsher than some of Mr Cashman’s statements statements on Twitter, for example smearing Corbyn supporters as vicious:
But it seems that Mr Cashman’s history as a prominent LGBT activist – he is a co-founder of Stonewall – which the Pepper article praises, ought to make him immune from criticism of alleged hypocrisy and insincerity:
Friends defend friends, fair enough – but apart from the fact that people still say ‘besmirch’, it’s interesting that having done something good is supposed to render criticism of current actions and statements ‘disgraceful’.
Or besmirching, for that matter.
But it seems that Mr Cashman – surprisingly, for someone who says he believes members’ voices and opinions should be heard – agreed with this assessment. And goes even further:
Stonewall is the largest gay rights organisation in Europe. Mr Cashman compared Red Pepper to people who resisted its creation – presumably homophobic people. Yet the Pepper‘s only mention of Cashman’s sexuality is to praise his work for LGBT rights:
Cashman’s advocacy of gay rights at a time when the Tories were still upholding Section 28 is to be applauded.
Readers will draw their own conclusions about the appropriateness or otherwise of Mr Cashman’s reaction, but it certainly does nothing to weaken the SKWAWKBOX’s recommendation that all Labour members with the best interests of the party and country at heart should vote for Seema Chandwani and Billy Hayes.
They may not have co-founded Stonewall, but they have steadfastly supported Jeremy Corbyn and his vision for Labour as a genuine alternative.
The SKWAWKBOX is provided free of charge but depends on the generosity of its readers to be viable. If you can afford to, please click here to arrange a one-off or modest monthly donation via PayPal. Thanks for your support so this blog can keep bringing you information the Establishment would prefer you not to know about.
Accusing people who aren’t homophobic of being homophobic.
Accusing people who aren’t anti-semitic of being anti-semitic.
Accusing people who aren’t misogynists of being misogynists.
I think we are beginning to see a pattern here. Are there no depths the discredited right wing of the Labour Party won’t sink to in its desperate attempt to cling onto the machinery of the party? This is also another excellent example of the right wing replicating the tactics used by the DNC corporatists like Hillary Clinton against progressives in the Democratic Party. It is almost as if they are formulating and sharing the same notes.
Mr Cashman and his fellow right wingers clearly do not care about truth, do not care about returning a Labour Government and couldn’t care less about constantly bringing the party into disrepute. Their only concern seems to be to keep control of key positions, no matter how much damage they cause to the party.
Angela Eagle did it last summer, accusing local officials with gay family members of not addressing alleged homophobia. Wallasey CLP remains suspended more than a year later, based on bogus smears that filled Angela’s chosen newspapers i.e most of them, plus all the usual BBC TV and radio channels.
None of the #FakeNews has been retracted.
She did not get her lackeys to report the alleged crime to the police, which tells us everything. Merseyside Police would have investigated, found nothing and possibly brought counter-charges of “wasting police time”.
Is there no new low to which these hard right throwbacks will not stoop?
Another example of the persistent but small rump of powerfully positioned right wingers still in denial of what the Party now is and whom it now represents .
The GE proved beyond any doubt what the electorate now wants and that is a true moderate left-wing Labour Party for the many not the few . My concern is not the outcome of the vote which I believe will be overwhelmingly for the moderate left candidates Seema and Billy but what the RW will do to nullify that result .
Such as at Conf last yr the imposition of regional reps on the NEC from Wales and Scotland excluding any democratic vote by the membership.
Will they try something similar with the CAC .
It is ridiculous and very regrettable that one has to be wasting time thinking like this rather than devoting effort to getting the Tories OUT, they are the real enemy of all but the privileged few .
“The GE proved beyond any doubt what the electorate now wants and that is a true moderate left-wing Labour Party for the many not the few”
Reality check.
2017 election results (excl NI):
For Labour 12.9m
Against Labour 18.1m
IMHO to all the good folks who are responding to G .Hindson you , I fear , are wasting your time and playing his game . His only intention and purpose is to cover the actions of his Govt paymasters by appearing reasonable on the surface but below is an all out Tory Troll who is as unpleasant as they come .Visit some of the articles surrounding Grenfell tower fire and note his ducking and diving to straight questions and utter lack of sensitivity and compassion , and then note here again on this topic the same pattern of comment .
His reason is to undermine this blog ,make you think it is unworthy of belief and to question its writers honesty. Whilst providing a blanket of cover for the actions of the establishment and his Govt who he defends every time very subtly . There is a very clear pattern of action that he masquerades as ” debate” but successfully in some cases “pushes all the right buttons ” ,that wind up ( me included but no more ) honest decent people with a moral conscience , something he clearly has none of .
No doubt he will respond to this in his usual whining way playing the injured sole who only wants debate , when in fact he wants to shut down and destroy any alternative narrative to the one his puppet masters want you to hear.
I leave you to make the judgement and intend no insult to any who have genuinely tried to engage in meaningful debate with this Troll
‘What does he mean by ‘ordinary’ members? If he’s suggesting Corbyn supporters are anything other than ‘ordinary’ then he’s a hypocrite.
I was gonna say in an earlier thread that something like this isn’t beyond them, and that I was half expecting it, but I held my piece and waited. I was right to – it didn’t take long.
So what if he’s a homosexual? Not an issue in today’s world. Why make it one? Being gay doesn’t mean when you stamp your feet everybody should give you your way.
Homosexuality is not the only issue that needs addressing in society; in my opinion there are far more pressing matters. Addressing poverty, the economy, brexit, education, the NHS, etc.
Oh, and so what if he was a third rate actor in a third rate soap opera?
Does that make me a ‘thespophobe’ now?
As for him making accusations of guilt by association – Remind me -What’s his ‘Stonewall’ colleague’s (Tatchell) view on paedophilia, again?
Glass houses, cashman…
I agree with everything the above writer says…Corbyn is trying to put things right for EVERYONE~ not just the selfish minority groups!…..You’re getting on everyone’s nerves…