Lewisham’s deputy mayor Janet Daby has been selected to stand for Labour in the Lewisham East by-election, after a chaos-strewn hustings and vote.
Ms Daby was supported by the right, but the fact that a candidate who voted for Corbyn in both leadership elections has won the selection is far from a disaster for the left and shows that the right in Lewisham East did not fancy its chances of pushing through a Blairite.
The SKWAWKBOX has received very positive comments about Ms Daby even from left-wing Lewisham members, who will now be looking forward to seeing her play an active role in supporting the leadership in Parliament, as Lewisham East is considered a safe Labour seat after Labour won it in 2017 with an increased 67% vote share.
Commiserations to Claudia Webbe and Sakina Sheikh, both of whom will no doubt make strong Labour MPs in the near future.
The SKWAWKBOX needs your support. This blog 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 solidarity so this blog can keep bringing you information the Establishment would prefer you not to know about.
If you wish to reblog this post for non-commercial use, you are welcome to do so – see here for more.
Time will tell …her actions will be the acid test .Perhaps she might be able to drag her rightwing friends around to accept the leadership and get on supporting JC
I won’t be holding my breath on the past performance of the RW Blairites their ultimate aim is another Tory govt rather than a Labour one under JC
Surely a missed opportunity by the left – why 2 candidates and why didn’t CW stand aside to enable SS to win? (or if CW had the best chance, SS should have stood aside). Also, disappointing that the right’s shenanigans this morning are simply accepted as part of the game – not a great day to be a Labour Party member.
It was transferable vote and Ms Daby won on round one with more than half, so wouldn’t have made any difference. As for the shenanigans, no acceptance – but if the actors can be identified, kick them out of the party. Labour will be better for it
Actual votes: JD 288, SS 135, CW 35. So, yes wouldn’t have made any difference. But, in a 1600 member CLP with over a thousand new members (if the CLP follows the average for old/new members), only 35 for CW. On the other hand, SS did remarkably well given the attempt to disbar her – like you say, the culprits need to be identified.
The whole thing needs investigating-we’ve now got the Branch secretary telling the left not to campaign in case it puts off voters(Owen Jones on Twitter) & look at the audience for the hustings(Joani Reid retweeted by Aaron Bastani)-no wonder it was held at 9:30 am!
If the NEC hadn’t produced its’ shortlist, bet you we’d have had 4 white males from the local party nominated.
Funny but having read thro all the controversy surrounding the hustings and hence final vote I can’t but help feel that something underhand has gone on perpetrated by the RWingers and it’s worked ?
Interesting how the controversy only applied to the left wing candidate and not the right , I guess the only positive thing is that the NEC seat that would have become vacant now still resides with the LW .
Despite the positive angle put on the result by SB I still believe that the only answer is the utter marginalising of the RW and their LFI cohorts ,, as we can see they are utterly ruthless in their activities to stop a true socialist Labour govt from ever taking power
Well done to Janet.
A word of caution and advice for Janet. 65% of constituencies voted to leave the EU.
As she is now the candidate for Labour she has a responsibility to help return a Labour Government.
She would be well advised to dissaossciate herself from the right wing Labour groups who are refusing to accept the referendum result. By defying the mandate of 65% of constituemcies they are to all intents and purposes campaigning on behalf of the Conservatives.
I trust that Janet will remember Labour is a national party and hope that she will now stop campaigning for the Conservative party by refusing to accept the referendum result.
She represents her constituents who overwhelmingly voted to remain. She also represents the Labour party membership of whom a majority also voted to remain.
She does not represent UKIP supporters or Hard Brexit Rees-Moggians
Disappointing, Pro-EC Labour members need to recognise that they are not supporting a Social Democratic Vision of the EC as was but a Neo- Liberal captured EC that is; you are essentially supporting Neo-Liberalsm!
Just been to a great socialist history group meeting at The Red Shed in Wakefield, West Yorkshire, on the brilliant socialist book ‘The Ragged Trousered Philanphropists’ by Robert Tressell and what has become clear to me is the lack of reading of many of the Labour Right and others.
And as someone once argued you need to read, read, read!
I would argue we only have one life and should aim to transform society in the UK as an example to the World, let humanity know you existed!
We don’t want crumbs we want the table!
An old Leftie in the meeting made a great point, the rich and powerful are dead miserable despite all their wealth “they hate the working class for having a good laugh despite having little” but they also said a local pub was a Fascist Pub so on my tour of working class pubs, I went there, and was ready.
And in there were a few black people, the white poor, a few Asians (not sure backgrounds) and some Irish, all interacting and having a good laugh and interesting conversations and it brought a tear to my eye,
Oh Lefties “Don’t believe the hype!”
Brothers and sisters, let’s stand for left wing democratic socialism and be honest with diverse working people and we can win in the UK and in every country in the World!
Solidarity & X.
BBC Fake News are already portraying this as a victory for the right in the LP
Great reporting, Skwawkbox, of the whole of the Lewisham East saga. Its hard to believe that the Blairite faction who have been trying to cause all this trouble are actually adults instead of the school yard bullies they resemble so closely!