Two out of three areas of focus look more like pretext for targeting the party’s left
Keir Starmer and his deputy Angela Rayner have announced an ‘independent’ investigation into the leaked Labour report highlighting the actions of right-wing former staff, who the report accuses of sabotaging the Labour party’s electoral efforts and obstructing disciplinary processes.
However, the details of the announcement have raised concerns that Starmer’s investigation looks more like a pretext for action against the left of the party, as two out of three of its areas of focus involve investigating those who commissioned and created the report – and those who leaked it when no action was taken:
We will therefore commission an urgent independent investigation into this matter. This investigation will be instructed to look at three areas. First, the background and circumstances in which the report was commissioned and the process involved. Second, the contents and wider culture and practices referred to in the report. Third, the circumstances in which the report was put into the public domain.
The SKWAWKBOX can also confirm that Starmer received a copy of the report almost as soon as his election as leader was announced. However, no action was taken until the report was leaked.
Starmer’s announcement also seems to hint at a potential circling of the wagons around those the report accuses:
In the meantime, we ask everyone concerned to refrain from drawing conclusions before the investigation is complete and we will be asking the General Secretary to put measures in place to protect the welfare of party members and party staff who are concerned or affected by this report.
If this investigation goes ahead, those who commissioned or leaked the report should not be its object. Those found guilty of the behaviour the report alleges must be censured, not those who exposed it.
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.
Assange all over again, don’t attack the initial perpetrators of criminal actions but those that report it.
Attack and smear leakers/reporters is from a well tried and tested playbook to deflect from the content. The war on Syria has provided a wealth of recent examples of how this works.
” we ask everyone concerned to refrain from drawing conclusions before the investigation is complete ”
… except in the case of antisemitism allegations, where we will automatically assume a priori guilt if the BoD/JLM gives us the nod. (It’s serious – we’ve bought knee-pads with Party funds to assist our grovelling).
It is essential that we (the membership) are told who authorised the Labour Party’s lawyers to try and suppress this report and who decided it should be withheld from the EHRC investigation.
It is absolutely essential that senior officials and/or members of the PLP who were involved in these attempts at the censorship of the truth and attempting to pervert the conclusions of the EHRC are held to account for their decisions.
Is there any information on who actually drew up the report and who commissioned it?
I agree everything needs to be out in the open.
SteveH 13/04/2020 at 7:29 pm · ·
I agree everything needs to be out in the open.
Really?
You weren’t too keen for starmer to release his donations list…
Toffee – The info on his donors will be published by the HofC authorities in the next few days
Far too late; not published by slime himself in the interests of transparency, and you didn’t have a problem with him not publishing.
Hypocrite.
Today’s Morning Star editorial has it nailed:
.
“The left has to learn from the ways in which the right secured Corbyn’s defeat: its understanding that there was a real clash of class interests and its determination to ensure the ruling class won.
By comparison, much of the left engaged in a futile effort to bury real differences and appease an irreconcilable enemy.
As long as we keep making such mistakes, we will keep losing.”
https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/labours-leaked-report-records-class-struggle-control-party
” However, no action was taken until the report was leaked.”
Except make the decision not to forward it to ECHR. Now we know why that action was taken. yes “circling the wagons” is the conclusion I draw.
What is truly appalling is that the report had to be leaked. As members we are the Labour Party,there is no justification for this information not being made available to us. It is our membership fees,our donations,the raffle tickets,mugs and calendars we buy that pay for the staff. It is not for an elite coterie to filter what we are allowed to know. They work for us.
The report casts shame upon all those including Len McCluskey who urged Corbyn to adopt the IHRA definition. It was obvious at the time and still is, that the definition is a deliberate ploy to demonise anyone who criticises Israel or Zionism.
Exactly as here, across the pond, those who control the “Left” is afflicted by a breathtaking, naivety and a terminal inability to manage reality. Because deadweights have a monopoly on what is laughably described as “strategy”, we have this – https://www.rt.com/usa/485715-bernie-sanders-endorses-joe-biden/
We urgently need an army of practical people. Plumbers, Landscape gardeners, nurses, surgeons, doctors, scientist, post and refuse collecting people. The list is endless. We need to DUMP those obsessed with theory‼️‼️‼️ Any person with common-sense here, across the pond, and ANYWHERE, would no that Biden, Clinton and the Obamas OFFER NOTHING but the same old sane old. Sanders now endorses the awful DNC engineered confused tool of the SAME OLD SAME OLD. Sanders act no proves beyond doubt that we need to remain in OUR PARTY and DRIVE out the DEADWEIGHT THEORIST. The deadweights who are determined to continue with a FAILED detached culture. They are determined on one thing… a determined FOG of TIRED damp limp counter productive reaction. There is no reason why we cannot be as determined like the red and blue Tories. It is no excuse to leave the party when the right wing demonstrated the effectiveness of staying and fighting. To even think of leaving is symptomatic of the defeatist disease on the left. To fail to argue our case on the MSM yet moan about the evil MSM is no good. It is a tired weak argument. The revelations now were sat on for FOUR YEARS. They were sat on because of a genuine belief that it is best not to upset the big bad bullies. Foggy, irresponsible, jellied weakness. Think of it. The ONLY deviation from jellied weakness was to kick Chris, Ken and George under every passing bus. Think of it. Where did that sign of life come from??? We cannot keep making excuses. The revelations are consistent with my observations locally and my posts.
A decision was taken to appease. Any primary school child would have defended themselves against the obvious LIES that were aimed at the membership. Where was the responsibility to defend members unfairly accused❓❓❓
I say NEVER appease! NEVER be illogical. See the wreckers for what they are, rather than some weird pathetic idealistic fantasy. My sympathy is for those who were let down and abandoned… thrown under buses. We must remain, fight and put things right. Organise and believe and NEVER again indulge those who refuse to deal with the real world and basic issues here and now‼️‼️‼️ We have more than enough to to here. How could anyone find even one minute to write worthless statements about issues in India and Pakistan❓❓❓ That is just one eg of avoidance i have observed which screams detachment from grass root basic issues here. There is no shortage of ability. It is snuffed out by learned and embedded victim culture. “Work around x x x x x ” according to McD typifies that victim culture. NB the inconsistency. Why did McD not insist on working around Chris Williamson, or George Galloway❓❓❓ If we DUMP FOR GOOD that sort of incoherent confused and DECEITFUL pathetic attitudes, we can recover and win this battle. That is what it is. A battle that can be won. It takes a grasp of REALITY and RESOLVE 🌹🌹🌹
ARE AFFLICTED. please excuse other errors. 🌹🌹🌹
would KNOW that Biden… SORRY I WILL read every post from now on, before sending. Much ashaned.
Don’t be SPNWC , I get your passion and anger in the text , I do the same,, as do others when typing from the heart . IMO WE ALL want the same on the Left , that is fairness , justice and equality and right now the DNC and Starmer Labour ain’t ANY of it . I await the outcome of the so called enquiry and hope to be proved wrong ….
Can’t understand why Corbyn McDon ,, Burgon, Tricket , etc are quiet on this ,
Burgon, Trickett and Lavery haven’t been quiet.
https://twitter.com/RichardBurgon/status/1249657784909680641
Maria, if i’v not heard it, then they are quiet. Just as in the USA, Sanders has a huge social media following and followers. PROBLEM: that is a self selecting clique. A large one but still a clique. Many people do not use twitt face and all that other stuff.
Some like me have never even owned a television. Years ago in Islington then Waterloo, we did have TVs in the kitchen, bed and sitting rooms etc. They were not mine, i hasten to add, would not dream now of keeping on top of current affairs by TV… esp the BBC. Twit facing etc is also not used by me and many. And, face twitting etc, were it up to me, would be used IN ADDITION to ROBUST ASSERTIVE FOCUSED and SUSTAINED SELECTED MSM radio outlets and ALL decent alternative media with of course SKWAWKBOX.ORG being given first preference at all times.
Skwawkbox is the ONLY of the decent media that recognise the essentials… the basics… the VITAL need to be grounded in reality. Up front‼️ Dynamic‼️ AHEAD of the curve by months‼️ Time is tight but i’m positive that you can check the archive and see Skwawkbox and posters have been ahead re being incisive. The limp untethered drift and “jellied weakness” at the heart of JC’s team was boldly described here. Were the warnings and observations heeded, we may be in government now. Instead vermin were pampered and peerages pumped out to them, while people who are the very definition of decency and COURAGEOUS virtue like Chris Williamson, were abandoned, betrayed and expelled. Where is the virtue in that??? There is none. Neither is there any sign of true challenging reflection. None whatsoever.
So twitting is not enough. Nor is soul destroying mumbling and barely audible passive aggressive occasional appearances. It serves no useful purpose to give ambiguous feedback. Who would want a surgeon to do an ambiguous cardiac operation … or any operation❓❓❓
The cultural deficits obvious on the “TRUE Left” are rightly not indulged in other areas of life. There are no other SUCCESSFUL … EFFECTIVE environments where goals are achieved … life and death situations… NO OTHER environment where well meaning people use scarce energy and time to defend and preserve failed techniques, failed attitudes and bewildering incoherence of “virtue” and un virtuous decisions aplenty. We must face up to that and change. Now is the time. We have the chance to rebuild. Seize it. 🌹🌹🌹
thanks rob. v understanding of u re my many errors. just spotted another one ashaned instead of ASHAMED . If i received one pence for each time iv tried to type OF and it becomes IF, there would be lots of money for chocolates.
Anyway, agree č you on “quiet” of JC, McD, Burgon & Tricket etc. TOTALLY incomprehensible. That is why we could never sustain a govt had we won. The hostilities would have been in super drive. There would have been no defence, no push back, no offensive. Rob, we CANNOT continue like that. That is neither kind, gentle consistent, nor realistic. NOT LEADERSHIP.
Where’s the decency of failing to lift a finger to defend thousands of unjustly expelled members❓ Where’s the kindness in that❓ How could the facts of the revelations now be withheld by lawyers USING OUR MEMBERSHIP FUNDS❓❓❓ What decent person remains silent and absent on that❓ It is worthless and self indulgent to be satisfied or comforted by a sense of being right or good. We must BE good. Put goodness in EFFECTIVE ACTION.
We need to CLARIFY our goals and HOW EXACTLY we will achieve them STEP by STEP. SEQUENCE. PRIORITIES grounded in REALITY… how people ARE… rather than how we would like them to be.
We teach children that fact of life via fairy tales…. Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Princess and the Pea etc. Of course they come with the bigotry, sexism and other ills of their age, BUT they deal with basic urgent common sense, that frauds must be tested, confronted and dispatched.
Starmer & co abuse red rosettes. Their actions and the CHUMS they keep, PROVE that they are wicked frauds. WOLVES in grannies’ nightdresses. They are not sweet little grannies. They are nasty Nasty NASTY little disgusting repellent bits of filth.
Thank you Maria , I take that back due to my ignorance and not keeping up daily on the Twitter feed
I expect many have done it. I now go and check first or try to remember to. I’ve missed stuff on a few occasions. I’m not even on Twitter but it is an easy check for what politicians are saying about a subject or not saying.
Normally I ” do the rounds” but the weather has been so good I’ve been “doing the rounds in me back yard ” instead ;-))
people have lbc radio on all day, in taxis, pharmacies etc. construction workers and people working outdoors, white van drivers etc WORKERS are listening ALL DAY. They cannot stop work to search out a twit or two from anyone. To still believe that the public should go in search of utterances on twitter is THE grave mistake made here and by Bernie Sanders TWICE‼️ How could anyone fail TWICE despite a vast army of paid and unpaid intelligent SUPER WELL READ people❓
Possible because they are well practised at saying “nice” things “nicely” to those with whom they already agree. Possibly because they have practised for decades being “comradely” with no scrutiny of the term. Which comrade wants a comrade reluctant to give frank warnings and feedback❓ What good is it mourning a comrade who got a bullet in the back of the head, because a “comrade” failed to say watch out⁉️⁉️⁉️
Actions must be effective. Since neither Rob nor i was aware of the tweeting you went in search of, then the tweet makers were ineffective. Un broadcasted utterances are as good as silence.
A perception of silence is silence. The action is inadequate. The action has failed. To excuse that failure is a grave mistake. Excusing those errors GUARANTEE failing again. It is evidence of low standards re how we achieve change. There is an adage: when we start to tire of hearing or saying something, many have only just heard it.🌹🌹🌹
Signpost is spouting his usual B/S again I see. The MSM will of course be completely aware of the ‘Report’ and its contents, and they DON’T need any left-leaning MPs voicing their anger and concerns to feel obliged to cover the story/report AND would of course do so of their own volition if they were truely what they claim to be. But then just about everyone on the left knows that they are not! Except for signpost that is, who lives in the constant illusion that the corporate MSM are going to publish and cover anything that exposes the lies and falsehoods – ie the smear campaign – that THEY have conspired in from the outset, along with the BBC, to undermine and sabotage Jeremy’s leadership AND demonise both him and the left membership.
And HE – signpost – would have people believe he’s a left-wing Jeremy Corbyn supporter. Of course he’s not….. he’s a complete and utter fraud, and he’s whole style of writing is just a complete joke. Think Integrity Initiative!
Anyway……..
On 13 April, the Socialist Campaign Group (SCG) of Labour MPs issued a statement calling for Labour to publish the report “in full officially”:
https://www.thecanary.co/uk/news/2020/04/15/mps-demand-keir-starmer-publishes-the-leaked-labour-report-officially-and-in-full/
Extract from Morningstar ” that senior Labour Party staff “openly worked against the aims and objectives of the leadership of the party, and in the 2017 general election some key staff even appeared to work against the party’s core objective of winning elections.”
Well hang on a minute what was it that Mandelson stated , something like everyday working to undermine JC .
With that sort of Senior official and MP spouting that crap then there is clearly imo a connection between these staffers actions and his comments tacitly endorsing such actions . Whey the fxxx is he still in th eLabour Party , expel bloody lot of them
There is also an excellent and detailed article on the Socialist Appeal website.
“Labour leaked report: Drain the cesspit!
A recently leaked report on the shenanigans of officials at Labour HQ reveals a cesspit of bullying and bureaucracy, designed explictly to undermine the Corbyn movement. Labour activists must organise and fight to sweep out the saboteurs.
http://www.socialist.net/labour-leaked-report-drain-the-cesspit.htm
my point exactly rob. it is wrong to make excuses for those who failed to expel Mandelson, Blair, Twatson, Hodge, Ashworth etc
It reminds me of Ryan Holiday’s book ‘Trust Me I’m Lying’ – A playbook for the dark arts of exploiting the media.
Broad CHurch my ARSE !
I’m with you Rob!
Critical path analyses
Take control of party
If needs be mount a leadership challenge
Work on union members to kick out red Tory union leaders
Goes without saying, JVL in JLM out
How do we get rid of Pantomime Dame, I have no clue
Be as ruthless as them and stick together like shit to a blanket
Regards
Unfortunately this leak gives the EHRC the excuse it needed not to report – now they don’t have to choose between finding “No case to answer” and resigning.
I suspect Isaac and Hildenrath have begged Labour for a way out, after having conspired with them in the destruction of the left by delaying their fictitious “report” until after the election.
If a court demanded to see the results of their work to date I believe the EHRC would have little more than a single sheet of A4 to show – there was no reason whatever to waste time doing any actual work since the “noises off” around the “investigation” were all the MSM needed to condemn Corbyn and Labour.
I sincerely hope it’s true that nothing ever really disappears from the internet. When some future genius finds the evidence I hope we jail every last one of the fuckers – and I hope that worry fills their sleep with nightmares for however long it takes.
“it will not be submitted to the Equality and Human Rights Commission that is currently investigating antisemitism within the party, as party lawyers have reportedly decided that it is not within the scope of the external probe.”
Who decided that “scope of the external probe”??? Surely, if it is an “external probe”, the scope should be determined by the “external” probers and be based on logic. How “external” are the probers? Who probes the probers?
The fact that my membership fees and donations (that I had to go without food so as I could donate) went to pay these wreckers at the top says that I was miss-sold my membership. I paid my dues to fight for a Labour government. I want my donations and my fees back not a whitewash report on the report !
The mental health tropes and slurs and tropes made by these people in the report are disgusting yet nothing has been said, no apology or anything from LOTO office. Condoners, that is what they are !!
Have any of these corrupt feckers even been susupended ? Do we have to mass report them to get this result even though it’s there for all to see ?
If you had an argument with your partner, would you ask their mother to arbitrate? It doesn’t matter how correct we are, or how wrong the other side are, they’re the key holders and they’ll do what they want. Complaints and procedures either will be forgotten or ignored. People making the complaints will be vilified and possibly investigated, as has already been happened agaisnt a disabled member. He was investigated after a complaint was made against a councilor whose comments were deemed bad enough for the police to force an apology. The councilor wasn’t investigated, but the LP investigated the disabled person with not even a charge levelled.
The Jewish Chronicle recently came second in a legal case against a LP member. Lies had been reproduced in their rt wing rag. The lies that were fed to them were by LP members. A disgusting social media campaign is continuing against Audrey, by LP members, but nothing will be done.
We have the millionaire class in charge and we have too many careerist minded individuals trying to get on the payroll, so will ‘just follow orders’. We’re kidding ourselves if we think the LP is democratic. It never was even under Corbyn, and little chance of becoming so under the new management.
Has anybody got a list of Starmer’s investigation team into the leaked report?