10 questions for candidates for Labour leader and deputy leader
The 10 commitments are authored jointly by Jewish Voice for Labour, the Labour Representation Committee and Red Labour.
We urge other socialist groups and individuals in the Labour Party to ask all leadership and deputy leadership candidates to provide their responses to them.
Commitments for a socialist Labour leadership
Will you commit yourself to working towards the achievement of the following policy goals?
1. End sub-contracting or outsourcing of NHS services; ensure that everyone who works in the NHS, from cleaners to consultants, has a secure contract of employment with trade union rights.
2. End tuition fees in higher education; reverse academisation in schools, restoring democratic control of state schools and ending the charitable status of private schools.
3. Implement a council housing programme as outlined in the 2019 party manifesto.
4. Transform welfare policy, ending punitive sanctions and bureaucratic traps that reduce people to poverty.
5. Take back into full public ownership Royal Mail, rail, water, electricity and gas, supporting cooperative, collective and community-owned projects.
6. Implement the Green New Deal, establishing carbon-neutral industries sited in those regions that have been long neglected, providing secure, sustainable, employment for future generations.
7. Repeal Tory anti-union laws; re-establish collective bargaining with national agreements wherever possible.
8. End trade in arms with states that break international law and commit human rights violations; Immediately recognise Palestinian statehood and protect the freedom to promote Palestinian rights.
9. Place Labour at the head of uncompromising opposition to all forms of racism and discrimination including Islamophobia and antisemitism, working in alliance with all sections of all communities vulnerable to right-wing attack.
10. Support open selection of all Labour Parliamentary candidates.
There seems to be nothing on free movement of people and immigration policy.
If anyone does not believe in any of the listed commitments,then they should not be in the Labour party.These commitments should equally be signed by every candidate wishing to be a Labour MP.Just as important no Labour member should be allowed afiliation to any similar Political organisation.
Go along with all of these
Will share forthwith
11. Cancel Trident nuclear status symbol replacement and sign the new treaty that prohibits nuclear weapons.
Absolutely agree.
All are very good aspirations and definitely some can be reached such as no prejudice towards Palestinians or race, gender etc but when it comes to others it takes a lot of money and time. I think part of the reason the public had a problem with the labour manifesto (not myself) was it sounded too good to be true whilst the Tory one sounded achievable and more grounded in the what is possible with the current economy. Of course we want student loans to go but we need the money to do this it sounds far better to say half the loans and look to ending them. We cannot quickly renationalise the NHS as Corbyn said it’s a matter of taking each contract one at a time. These are big things that take a lot of money. Yes I voted labour and I desperately want this achieved but we have come so far right we need to get back centre and tell the public what is possible in the here and now. Perhaps spending more per pupil and ensuring academies meet definite regulations before eradicating them. Not that it shouldn’t happen eventually but the public have to believe the party is not replacing the possible with idealism. I was not a fan of Blair but people trusted him and Gordon Brown to do the best with what they had rather than make unachievable promises. As aspirations these are all good but immediately it leads to the media yelling extremists, Marxists or the party of debt when that is not true. It scares voters because they need a sense of realistic policies that don’t need a money tree. Remove what is aspirations so that it can’t leave the party looking too idealistic. Let the public know you work with the economy you have. Be sure that the centre norms are first met which is global companies paying fair taxes and rich people paying fair taxes. Corbyn’s 26% is normal but the Tories have made it possible for the rich to avoid paying any tax and we are used to that. Before we see anything we need to see decent taxes paid back in from global companies and the top 5% which can afford much better services regulated well. We need the achievable before we can go further which is a fair tax amount (26% good) and then good services before we go national which one day I hope we get again but we have to be believed first. Anything is better than Johnson and a compromise to get back to middle ground is where we need to be.
Excellent start
Make a law so any manifesto promise or lies told to voters to secure a vote is punishable by expulsion if member of Parliament or PM
Great questions
I can not vote for anyone who is not prepared to answer these 10 questions
My only reservation is in respect of our NHS! The commitment stops short of renationalisation of it!
Great list.Thankyou.
Agree entirely.
Agreed and shared
Excellent JVL & co. RLB would have no probs with these! Neither would RB, DB or AR.
Love it
Sounds good. I am however somewhat sceptical of the Carbon Neutral stance. This is a very expensive venture and I suspect that planting trees is all it needs to remove the carbon and free-up oxygen.
Perhaps, instead of adding issues to make a long list – as happened with the promotion of the manifesto (which itself was fine) – it should be prioritised in order of urgency. Perhaps secure homes should come first? The principles of tackling climate change and protecting the local environment should should be the filter for most actions. Or perhaps we should just ask candidates to sign up to implementation of the 2019 manifesto?!
What a brave woman, saying things so many of us are thinking, but being careful about writing – because we don’t want to be thrown out of the Labour Party.
One step towards improvement would be a revamping of C-OMPLIANCE so that anyone accused, as well as everyone else, would know exactly what tthe suspenced person was accused of and what was the evidence for it. Furthermore, such matters should be dealt with in a timely manner.
I will only support candidates who support these goals. Anything short of these will not be acceptable.
[JVL editor comments: The original meaning of the term antisemitism is not as RH suggests below. It was coined by Wilhelm Marr in 1879 precisely to describe the anti-Jewish campaigns under way in central Europe at that time. The title of Marr’s pamphlet was explicit, “Der Weg zum Siege des Germanenthums uber das Judenthum. (The Way to Victory of Germanicism over Judaism”). So it is quite misleading to try to return to an orignal, broader meaning. There isn’t one.]
Perhaps ‘Denial of the rights of Palestinians’ should be specifically listed as ‘anti-semitic’racism – ?
Time to re-own the original, broader, meaning of the term given present distortions.
Why doesn’t anyone ever have a 9- or 11-point plan?
Disqualification of any candidate who advocates handing over control of the Labour Party’s disciplinary processes to an outside body?
Absolutely correct we follow the agenda. There’s no way out of the Tory mess unless Labour seizes this moment, gets a leadership team in place and then the MPs and CLPs support such a natural, social agenda.
Given that we are seeing candidates being given less than common law and integrity when charged with misdemeanours, something has to be done regarding transparency within all Labour structures. Any complaints must be observable and punishments cannot be given at the whim of the executive without guilt being satisfactorily proven.
I fully support the ten policy statements put forward by JVL.
Such an excelent and basic list – all Labour members should subscribe to it..
Reminded what life should be about by Corbyn, It sounds like a Labour party I can be proud of . THOSE who cannot commit wholeheartedly should should be asked to leave the party . No “interest” in Age, Race, Original Nationality, religion, (or lack of it,) Gender, (OR lack of it,) Great wealth, or “Notoriety” should be allowed to override, or be used as an excuse for challenging the principles of a socialist party Which has a real concept of Equality.
To JVL editor on RH’s comments above.
Kol Hakavod [well done – ed] on calling him out on his post.