For a party which flourished on socialist principles, and was meant to democratically represent the working class, the imposition of an exorbitant £25 fee for the right to vote in the upcoming leadership election might have seemed dangerously like Labour’s last gasp.
But now that the ban on the voting rights of recent members has been overturned by the High Court, the party’s National Executive Committee is scrambling for yet another way to usurp their wishes and quash Jeremy Corbyn once and for all.
The decision to make all members who joined the party after 12 January ineligible to vote, unless they stumped up an additional £25, was branded a ‘breach of contract’ by The Hon. Mr Justice Hickinbottom. The NEC has vowed to appeal the verdict, with shadow chancellor John McDonnell calling the NEC’s actions ‘an attack on the basic democratic rights of members in our party’.
Imagine the furor from the so-called left if the Republicans had charged for the right to vote in the presidential primaries earlier this year, or if the Conservatives suddenly demanded funding from pre-existing members which could then be spent, for instance, on divisive campaigning in marginal constituencies?
But the High Court’s ruling is thought to benefit Jeremy Corbyn, as he stands to be re-elected as Labour leader in the face of a challenge from Owen Smith. Many of the 125,000-plus members who joined the party after 12 January are likely to be Corbyn supporters. So the Labour NEC – which is fittingly vying with UKIP’s for the title of worst party executive – has hit upon a new tactic which it hopes will prove decisive.
The simple plot is to make it impossible to vote or otherwise associate as a Labour party member without first having been a fervent supporter of the Tories. Prospective members will have to submit their applications with covering letters outlining how they are ‘open for business’, in favour of such international projects as NATO and TTIP, desperate to press the nuclear button, and most of all convinced that the public’s concerns regarding immigration – far from coerced or misguided, incendiary, or just plain racist – are in fact wholly ‘legitimate’.
Some flexibility on taxation will be allowed, and of course it’s always nice to trumpet the NHS. All the better if you swell with pride at passing white vans. But applications will only be considered with two Conservative references, which in a pinch can be obtained instead from the lesser members of UKIP. So if as expected the NEC’s appeal falls on deaf ears later this week, there might still be ways to stop the Corbyn faithful from voting.
