Tories for Corbyn

[Young Master Smeet]

Apparently Topby young, the prime instigator, has already been informed he won't be allowed a vote: nor a refund of his £3.  Fnar…

[ALB]

It's not just Tories who can, and maybe will, take advantage of Labour's open primary system for seleting a Leader. Judging by leaflets handed out at yesterday's anti-austerity march, non and even anti Labour Leftists will be too.  The front page of the Weekly Worker is given over wholly to a photo of Corbyn and the two words VOTE CORBYN and there are a couple of articles inside arguing for this.  One of them reports a resolution passed at a meeting of Left Unity's national council:

Quote:

If Jeremy Corbyn is on the ballot paper LU will support him via a press statement in discussion with his campaign. Indivudual members may want to support him in any other way.

This can only be interpreted as including signing up as a Labour supporter so as to be able to vote for him. This is what the Weekly Worker and its party, the self-styled CPGB, are explicitly urging.Writing in Counterfire (ex-SWPers) Lindsey German looks forward to a "mass campaign … with meetings up and down the country, drawing on the whole of the left", ending less rather than more cryptically:

Quote:

And any member of a trade union affiliated to Labour (which is most of them) can vote if they register to so before 12 August.

This is true, but there is a catch. The Corbyn4Leader campaign was handing out registration forms. This shows that members of unions affiliated to Labour can register for free (whereas others have to pay £3) but they and others have to sign and date a declaration:

Quote:

I support the Labour Party's aims and values and am not a supporter of any organisation opposed to it.

Which would seem to rule out members of another party or of groups which support candidates standing against Labour. Of course this won't stop members of an Machiovellist-Leninist group like the Weekly Worker, who are already members of Left Unity as well as their own party (and, some of them, no doubt of the Labour Party too under a different "cadre name"). Nor the Trotskyist organisation with their notorious tactic of  "entryism"..Or perhaps the various Trotskyist groups can justify signing on the grounds that their "organisation" is not really opposed to Labour.In any event, Labour's open primary system is open to abuse and will no doubt be abused. This could turn the whole thing into a farce (or, rather, even more of one).

[Young Master Smeet]

Herein Corbyn's sotto voce warning about ill intentioned joiners:A siren call to rag and tag trotkyites of the world to unite in Labour.  As one commentator notes, vetting by branches gives the possibility of som branches vetting known local lefties out…

[jondwhite]

Well rag-tag Trots always used to lend their (sometimes critical) vote to Labour in general elections, now they can lend their subs money, ability to pick leaders (lol) and personal details too. I really think it will damage the Trots more than it will Labour.None of this is an indictment of open primaries (or open elections) to select people to committee positions. If its purely technical and we are only ever selecting delegates at most then members are still in control of policy. Democracy means those you disagree with having a vote.

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