Unite branches showed anger at ‘centrist’ MP
Scottish Labour MP Ian Murray has become the first MP to be triggered, not by local Labour Party members, but by affiliate branches. Labour rules allow both member branches and affiliated branches of unions and socialist societies to trigger a selection if one third of a constituency’s branches vote for it.
Many right-wing MPs have been able to escape being triggered because of their tight hold on member branches. Murray – a member of right-wing pressure group Progress and a participant in the failed ‘chicken coup’ – has become the first to be forced by affiliates to fight to retain his place.
The trigger threshold was reached by votes of Unite union members. A union spokesperson said:
This decision was taken by Unite members following consultation with the relevant committees and branches of the union under our democratic processes.
Our members are clearly concerned that Ian Murray has consistently undermined the Labour leadership in Scotland and at Westminster, and has on occasion attacked our union. No MP is entitled to their seat. It is for Mr Murray to now demonstrate why Unite members in Edinburgh South should return him as their representative.
In a statement issued on Twitter, Murray said:
It is disappointing that in the week where I’m leading the People’s Vote campaign in Scotland and working around the clock to maintain the cross-party coalition that’s defeating Boris Johnson [sic] disastrous Brexit in order to protect workers’ jobs and rights, that this is Unite’s priority. My constituents are my priority and I won’t be distracted from fighting for them.
SKWAWKBOX view:
Murray’s reference to the Blairite-driven ‘People’s vote’ campaign in his response to his potential deselection says it all.
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 or here for a monthly donation via GoCardless. 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.
He deserved to be deselected merely for his role in the “People’s Vote” effort. Capitulating to the second referendum crowd, which is indeed Blairite-led, has doomed Labour with the electorate.
Yep, good riddance to that vicious Right Wing Blairite serial saboteur, Murray, – BUT the MUCH bigger picture of Labour’s electorally suicidal now ever clearer Remain and Second Referendum stance , makes such potential deselections of a few Right Wingers pretty small beer – when widespread electoral wipe-out now faces us in many of our Labour heartland constituencies come a General Election (which can now only be on the carefully choreographed ‘we are the champions of the 2016 Referendum decision to Leave’, narrative that Johnson and Cummings have carefully crafted, thanks entirely to the collapse of Labour into its ‘Remain at all costs’ position).
And good related article in today’s Morning Star – with Grimsby’s Labour MP, Melanie Onn (Grimsby voted 71% for Leave) explaining in detail why she voted for the Johnson Brexit Deal. Melanie actually EXPLAINS some of the many restrictions EU membership puts on a Left Government economic agenda – and points out that an incoming Labour government could still steer the two years of negotiations to come in a decisively Left direction. Not things the Right Wing Remainer trolls on here or the Mandelson PV campaign wants people to know !
Of course the now ever clearer pro Remain and second Referendum stance of Labour in its various leading light Shadow Cabinet public pronouncements now makes this electoral victory highly unlikely ! Craven Left (ie, Left Liberal) cowardice and political ignorance and Right wing PLP cynical manoeuvring have in fact most likely delivered a future electoral victory to an even more viciously Right Wing Tory government than hitherto.
https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/f/melanie-onn-mp-why-i-am-supporting-boriss-brexit-deal
Hi Danny, totally agree with you, jcpenney, the toffee and Joseph here. I have followed the Brexit debacle with great interest and was willing to be persuaded from a neutral position. To date, the overwhelming arguments to justify LEAVE are all the regurgitations of the Blairites which even very decent intelligent, well meaning people suck up and pass on to others.
Note how frequently, three plus years later, people trump the “buying a house”, “unicorns”, and “divorce” analogues, NB how they repeat those as if in possession of fresh insight and faultless analysis.
The above, is combined with a can’t do attitude from the passionate determined frustraters of something unlikely to happen in any meaningful way within the next 10 years minimum. Enough to convince us to be skeptical of the views injected into them. The situation makes me think of the parasitic tiny creatures that develop in a host creature, feeds off it, then leaves its hollowed out dead host, to parasitise anew and multiply.
With great disdain, you may hear two particular browbeating radio presenters, pontificating that LEAVING is uncertain, as if remaining isn’t. The major morphing of what our parents voted in the 70s, is proof – EU entanglement is no more uncertain than disentangling ourselves.
For crying out loud, just how do so many other extra EU countries survive? Even Switzerland and Norway, the former with many borders, the latter with an extremely long border with Sweden manage to trade without difficulty?
Furthermore, their quality of life is in many practical ways eg social & health care and life satisfaction, have for decades been superior to ours. Not to mention recycling and alternative energy. I have seen thousands of sq meters of land and sea wind farms all up the Baltic as far up as St Petersburg….speaking of which on my last visit to Russia, St Petersburg certainly appeared glorious in the extreme. Yes, i know one cannot get any feel for what it is like to live there from a visit. But they were not eating worms from under rocks.
Moscow was dreadful to me two decades ago, but I hear it is unrecognisably positive now and like China transformation of which we can only dream, has been achieved without being in the over worshiped EU. And, without the embarrassing dependency remainers display.
And wait, think of the Xenophobic attitude to “FREE MOVEMENT”. It is only free for some… who look like us. Were it otherwise, the 39 victims found dead in a refrigerated lorry this morning may not have happened. It came via a Dutch port! Yes in the EU!! With a lorry driver from Northern Ireland!!!
No one should be surprised to learn that the victims may have been fleeing war-zones, to which we have sold the arms and expertise to create thousands more widows, widowers and orphans.
But then again, the desperate europhile in chief said in parliament that if we did not sell arms someone else will. Wonder if that will disqualify the creature grasping its long sought status as the 1st most glittering, traffic stopping empress of the EU superstate complete with an extensive fawning entourage, the grandest motorcade in the history of the world, and the icing on the cake, an EU ARMY with which the Iraq assistant invader to Bush, could commit more to bloodshed, death and destruction.
But back to the WE MUST REMAIN obsession. I saw a film last night “UNWANTED” about the long running Windrush scandal. Get your organisers to screen it. Contact Draper Hall, Newington, to source it. Re the abuse of the Windrush generation, where was the outrage in the decades that they suffered? Where was the blanket media outrage? And now, while the scandal STILL persist, where are the virtuous marching against the treatmeant of British citizens??
Where are the virtuous campaigns supporting the dispossessed of the Chagos Islanders??? What has the sainted EU done to intervene on behalf of ANY of the above?… In fairness, they do have dire problems of their own. The Jillet Junes protests embargoed from our MSM, still rages. Hungary had Nazi torch marches apparently supported by their parliamentarians. Catalonians wishing for independence are imprisoned for as many as 13 years and campaigners brutalised by Spanish police. So, the EU are crippled by its own crises.
There was never a Nirvana. There is not one now. And if even there were, it most certainly is NOT the EU. We must and can make something anew and embrace the wider world with true fair trade not suspect foreign aid riddled with kickbacks to us and profits returning to us here.
We can renew a true commitment to abolish protectionist groups like the EU that keep the poor nations poor while paying hundreds of millions here to the UK’s richest land owners to keep land OUT of production – … spun as maintaining the hedgerows … maintaining the environment, while countries destitute for my entire lifetime, like Haiti, decimate their environment to get firewood in-fact, now fire-twigs for heating and cooking.
True Labour can hardly serve its purpose without considering the points outlined above.
♏️♦️♦️♦️
Jcpenny You put forward good argument,but for me personally the JC government and the end game of destroying the torys is all that matters.Nothing in politics can’t be negotiated.,and the idea at this crucial time to vote with the torys for a tory brexit is unforgivable.To ignore the democracy of a Labour party solution to the Tory brexit mess again is unforgivable and plays to the Tory brexit game.The end game is now and the general election is needed Asap,we can’t and the country cannot tolerate the poverty the food banks..the absolute misery any longer..Its so important..nothing else matters…end of!
Widespread electoral wipe-out now faces us in many of our Labour heartland constituencies come a General Election
You sound like you can’t wait. Give my regards to Charles Koch!
“Capitulating to the second referendum crowd”
LexiTories are such prats – bigging up someone like Murray for doing one thing that is sensible and democratic.
Better *extreme* right and Johnson, eh? – I like the priorities. Such is the kamikaze ‘left’. Never miss out on a chance to nose-dive into a winning strategy; simply moaning and losing is so much more comfortable.
‘Moaning and losing’ …That’s YOUR bag, squire.
Cheery-bye. (Hopefully)
People like murrey have to be removed,and good or bad affiliates are doing the job that the branch can’t or won’t do…..we live and learn and especially myself.comrades in solidarity
Monehan chucked off short list.
“.But the party emailed at 1pm on Wednesday telling him he had been removed from the shortlist “after due diligence.” They gave no specifics”
The anti-Semitism witch hunt is also allowing the party to narrow the field of candidates. Funny how those that campaign on these and similar issues are the ones to be chucked out of the party as well as off shortlists. It’s as if LP has to have approval of pro Israel factions in LP and UK.
https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/asa-winstanley/palestine-activist-removed-labour-shortlist-after-smear
I know little about the man or his history btw so have no idea what LP has supposedly dug up that make him an unsuitable candidate, CLP ain’t gonna get to decide about him that’s for sure. Blair is still a member and many MPs support Israel’s aggression unconditionally, smear and throw profanities at the leader and are lauded in media and even many in PLP.
So that means the party is not worth bothering with. The Tories are never worth looking at, and the other (un)fairly media represented parties are Tories too. In fact, I think 90%+ of the house are Tories (brigands).
If anything, the only person/s worth voting for now are the clowns of politics. Seems fitting that a clown would lead the end of western dominance.
Either that or write something in Russian on the paper…
“So that means the party is not worth bothering with.”
Well, it is on domestic issues, crumbs and hopefully better living standards for those most oppressed by austerity (which many PLP also voted for!) and privatisation but I have little hope much will change on foreign policy now. Seems Palestinians will be ‘sacrificed’ along with any MP, activist and anyone supporting Palestine/Palestinians trying to get into a more influential position. Grass roots can campaign all they like but allowing them to let off steam is important to keeping them onside.
Yes, I am very cynical these days but anti-war and those supporting truth about foreign policy and UKs often covert, manipulative, hypocritical and vicious role in the world are the ones being silenced.
Foreign policy is a crucial issue for me because, as I have said before, I believe it is fundamental to UK/western finance Capitalism and exceptionalism.
It appears the people found dead in the truck were Chinese nationals. I wonder what more, if anything, we will get to know about them.
https://www.rt.com/uk/471730-chinese-lorry-container-dead/
If Murray has been triggered if he has been supporting a right wing/Zionist coup, then fair enough. However if the triggering is because, like the majority of Labour members, he supports remain, then it’s yet another travesty.
My feeling is that there are Labour MP’s under management and control of Blair, Mandelson and Campbell who would rather see a victory for Cummings glove puppet than JC in Downing Street,
They also know as leaders of the Peoples Vote campaign they would lose any 2nd referendum against Labour brexit,
So when it comes to FTPA vote on GE which needs a two thirds majority a large number will vote against JC
They will hopefully fail, but also if there is any justice they will also have whip withdrawn and not be eligible to stand,
The deteatists on here who doubt a Labour victory, two points to make Nigel Farage and the Brexit party
JC and our manifesto
Watching Peston it’s clear that
McDonnell is a Peoples vote supporter but fails to acknowledge the numbers are not there for a 2nd referendum,
The vast majority just want us to leave with best deal which honours 2016 result 52/48
If the shit deal was amended CGP would pull it and call for a GE,
This is as far as parliament can possibly go,
Once extension is granted the pressure for a GE will sweep away No Deal and No Brexit supporters
Blairites will have choice of its JC’s way or the highway
” Blairites will have choice of its JC’s way or the highway”
They know that. But, as with GE2017, any progress ltd., third-way, rightists that survive the triggers (and that’s most of them), will never stop seeing renovated Labour as dangerous, and something which, under a pro-Palestinian rights leader and a moderate democratic socialist, they will obstruct.
Capitalism thwarts and weakens its barriers – and progrss ltd MPs do it in the Labour party.
J
Progress Ltd only exists for one reason: To stop Labour serving its socialist values and its people, the Many.
I hope Edinburgh South’s trigger results in his deselection.
Ian Murray MP is an affront to Leonard and Corbyn.
qwertboi
Leonard and Cohen, sounds good to me
Laughing Lenny for PM!
qwertboi
There has to be a red line no blairite can cross, fact is we the members and supporters of the party cannot see it yet,
They are still getting away with murder, but at some stage a stand will be made and a clear out will ensue
Would put my house on it, but my landlord might object
And we must note the 39 who.perished in the back of a truck yesterday,no doubt fleeing the starvation….the bombs…the terror 39and an absolute stain on the whole rotten system that allows such waste of innocent people,running away from whatever horror humanity created.How many more die in the back of a truck in thurrock or anywhere else ,..for me it puts our brexit debate into insignificance
Indeed it does.
Your comment made me think of the May’s during her spell at #10.
Hubby owns shares in weapons manufacturers. She launches, he gets paid…
When you think about it, nothing has changed since the days when they rescued the ponies and left the miners.
“When you think about it, nothing has changed since the days when they rescued the ponies and left the miners.”
Powerful image you conjured up for me with that comment.
Yes Joseph, I want to stop what role UK may have had in their countries that forced them to flee. Hopefully more details will emerge soon.
Regime change wars and covert destabilization actions also give rise to many heinous ‘profit’ opportunities which are big business the banks and off shore tax havens are involved in… human trafficking, organ trafficking, drug trafficking, weapons trafficking and sales etc. etc.
It will be interesting to see what his CLP members think about their MP being ousted by the unions when the OMOV ballot takes place.
Some good news from the EU Courts
The Tories’ hated Bedroom Tax was today dealt a landmark defeat in the European Court of Human Rights.
Judges ruled the benefit cut discriminated against a domestic violence victim who was forced to pay extra for her panic room.
The UK government has been ordered to pay the woman, who suffered rape and assault, 10,000 Euros (£8,600) for the “damage she suffered”.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/breaking-dwp-bedroom-tax-dealt-20714008