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Today was the London Regional Conference of the Labour Party at the Old
Town Hall in Stratford, E15.
I had my ward surgery beforehand and missed the opening
speeches and arrived towards the end of the plenary Housing debate.
The main hall of the Town Hall was packed with delegates. Standing room
only.
Activist Jeffrey Blay, 62 years a Party member received an award from Iain
McNicol, the General Secretary of the Labour Party as did the former London
Regional secretary, Ken Clarke.
Iain addressed Conference next. The last time he had been in this hall he
had "
piped in the haggis" for the Newham Burns Night (I
saw him do this in 2012. I wonder if any other political party has a bagpipe
player and black belt in Karate as its GS). He reminded everyone that the
Labour Party started in this town hall with the election of Kier Hardie in
1892. Sadiq Khan MP, in his first outing as Shadow Minister for London spoke
next and praised the Party links with hard working people through the trade
unions and slams the London Tory record on housing. London faces a catastrophic
housing crisis & social cleansing.
The morning session finished with the debate on the NHS. Picture above of
Maggi Ferncombe from UNISON moving the motion on defending London's NHS.
I didn't go to any of the lunchtime fringes due to a meeting but after the
end of the NHS (no pun intended) and the London economy debate, I attended the workshop on
Trade Unions and Labour Party Liaison. Chaired by Fiona Twycross with
UNISON Regional Secretary and Vice Chair Labour Board Linda Perks, Labour Party
Regional Secretary Alan Olive and Alan Tate from CWU.
A delegate got herself
into a little bit of a pickle when she realised that there could be a double
meaning to her claim that the Labour Party is always looking at Scandinavian
models! In the Q&A I mentioned the successful London training events London UNISON
has run for branch Labour Link officers and that you can arrange union meetings
at the House of Commons with friendly Labour MPs to attract rank and file
members who would never normally attend any union or political meetings.
My second workshop was led Margaret McDonagh and John Braggins on "
Winning
in low turnout areas and building our winning alliance". A key point
was that we should "
Stop Voter ID Now" (which will upset our
organiser!). Instead of asking people to do something for us (go out and
vote Labour) we should be asking them what we can do for them. Makes sense to me.
After the motion on the London Economy there were emergency motions on the
plans by Tory Mayor Boris Johnson to slash the fire service in London and the threat
to our education services from the so called "Free Schools". I
seconded the motion against Free Schools and will post my speech later. I then
had to run off to another commitment and missed the election results, the close
and the singing of the
Red Flag and
Jerusalem.
