No retrospective punishment say Jama & Pidcock
Published
by
Richard Kuper
JVL Introduction
At last some NEC members are taking the Party to task for its application of retrospective justice – or rather injustice.
In its indecent haste to purge socialists, the Labour Party bureaucracy is quite happy to throw people out for actions which were entirely within the rules at the time they were undertaken.
It is a sign of how far the corrosion of values has gone under in the current regime that there is little expectation of this Jama-Pidcock motion – common moral, legal and political sense – being carried at the NEC.
This article was originally published by Skwawkbox on Sun 21 Nov 2021. Read the original here.
Jama, Pidcock table NEC motion to ban retrospective punishment and rescind expulsions
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Agreed, retrospective punishment is an abomination. But why should anyone be punished for non-offenses like those of which Pamela Fitzpatrick, Heather Mendick and Jo Bird stand accused? Why should good socialists who have worked diligently for the party for many years be expelled for communicating with fringe groups whose views, while differing from those of the leadership, are located within the realm of acceptable left-wing opinion? Honest open debate is more valuable to the party than the authoritarian imposition of a single viewpoint.
I agree with Kuhnberg – just going after the retrospective aspect concedes and won’t do much given all the other ways that the right are going after the left. Anyway, you don’t just stop supporting comrades and friends in proscribed groups and I don’t see how you can prove you don’t.
The present Labour Party hierarchy is showing that it is unfit for government.
I agree in principle with the first two posts. However
the whole thing is a construction based on nothing ..
given that the proscription of these organisations
was effectively decided by a small selected group
of the NEC. It was then ratified by the NEC after a cursory
examination of the why’s and wherefores at the end
of a nine hour meeting.
It seems that for these organisations “support” of
them was never considered by the NEC and this
omission is criticised by Jama and Pidcock:
it is their opinion that the retrospective application
of “justice” is not allowed.
So – good luck Jama and Pidcock and I hope your
motion is at least considered.
Necessary..what a waste of creative energies tho’.
I’m pleased that Laura and Nadia have stepped up and tabled this motion, but agree with Kuhnberg that it doesn’t go far enough to support wonderful socialist councillors like Pamela Fitzpatrick and Jo Bird. Perhaps Laura and Nadia are trying to maximise the support they get on the NEC and that focusing on this issue is most likely to do that. In any case it is a welcome move and proof that the Left on the NEC is alive and kicking.
The key problem with this motion is that it only deals with one aspect of a much wider problem in which the Labour Party hierarchy and bureaucracy are operating outside of due process principles and standards.
What is required is one or both of the following:
1. A short straightforward motion compelling the Party at all levels to follow widely accepted due process legal principles and standards.
2. A class action to bring the hierarchy and bureaucracy to heel on these matters.
At present the Party at all levels is operating as a law to itself. As demonstrated in this example
https://mobile.twitter.com/acailler/status/1461258973802336264?s=20
Where, to quote from the horse’s mouth:
“Labour rules, unlike the actual law, are based on gender and not sex – therefore they go beyond the law, or as they would like the law, just like Stonewall does!”
In practice this example is no different in principle – at least for those who don’t operate on the basis of ‘my gang right or wrong’ – to what is happening on an equally regular basis to non conforming members of the Jewish Community, JVL members for example, who don’t toe the BoD/FoI line and their convenient self selecting/self referencing pseudo definitions.
If we are going to be serious about doing the business we cannot hope to defeat the Tory philosophy of one law for those we like and another for everyone else at the ballot box at any level. We have to act, and be seen to act, consistently to a set of principles and standards rather than picking and choosing to suit.
Though, given the stance and approach of too many fellow travellers in recent times, the odds do not seem particularly favourable.
As a regular contributor to Skwawkbox, may I recommend reading & contributing to this blog. I have regular differences of opinion with some contributors but debates are usually constructed in a serious & sometimes humorous manner.
Some time ago I wrote a comment doubting that the focus on complaining about retrospectivity would in most cases be fruitful. There may not be a uniform pattern in the accusations, but as I understand it the leadership faction’s tack in most cases is not to say “you are being punished for having supported a proscribed organisation before it was proscribed” but rather to say “your having supported a proscribed organisation suggests to us that you are now a supporter unless you can prove otherwise”.
As far as breaches of natural justice go this is just as bad, of course, because the only way a person prove they are not a supporter is to denounce that organisation or at least make a declaration in favour of their proscription.
As matters stand, without such denunciation, suspicion becomes the same as proof.
The attack has to be on the definition of “support/supporter”.