Labour’s Organisational Review – Affiliates
Posted: July 19, 2012 Filed under: Labour Transformation 4 Comments »I’m going through the recommendations of the review in no particular order. I don’t have a lot of time this evening, so I’m going to focus on one of the smaller recommendations: how Labour engages with it’s affiliated organisations.
Here is the recommendation which has been endorsed by the New Zealand Council:
Strong relationships with affiliates will be enhanced at local level through LECs and industrial branches and also through the regional organising hubs and New Zealand Council.
Unlike many of the other recommendations, this one is not accompanied by any rule changes – presumably the rules as they stand are adequate to facilitate the intended stronger relationships with affiliates.
TTammany thing that stands out to me is that these recommendations are somewhat different to the recommendations that were proposed in the original May 2012 discussion document, which included:
6. …
d) We discuss with affiliated unions ways of optimising affiliation.
e) We investigate means of affiliation for groups in the community.
So it’s interesting that the endorsed recommendations have dropped the desire to see more groups affiliated to the party.
The Labour Party currently has six affiliates, all trade unions (RMTU, MWU, DWU, EPMU, MUNZ, SFWU). During the consultation phase I heard several people suggest that the Party look to bring other groups on board as affiliates, or through some other relationship. I think that would be a healthy thing. For example, in the UK the Labour Party lists amongst its affiliates a range of non-trade union affiliates such as the Fabian Society and the Christian Socialist Movement. In the Herald today, Claire Trevett suggests the Ratana Church as a potential future affiliate.
There are also some other aspects of the review (leadership elections, selections, branch membership etc which will indirectly impact on affiliates, I’ll be touching on those in future posts.
In summary, I think that the review could have been bolder regarding affiliates, and it’s a shame we don’t have any concrete recommendations to “optimise affiliation” or to encourage new affiliates, as both were suggested in the May discussion document.
Patrick Leyland
Guest Post
James Caygill
Would be great to get more affiliates on our Labour membership list somehow. A real issue with had in Rangitkei was tracking people down in a diverse electorate that had union bases in Palmerston North, Wanganui, Hamilton and maybe more. If we had people on our membership list would have been much easier. Not sure what the rules are at the moment but something like to allow affiliates to easily register their details so they show up on our membership lists would be great. Maybe free membership for affiliates, I guess could use attraction of great say in leadership process etc. Would have to be done in conjunction with recruitment drives at affiliates union conferences, monthly meetings etc.
Hi Patrick,
Would be interested in your thoughts on this new rule?
New Constitutional Rule 146B
That a new Rule (numbered 146B for the purposes of this document) to read
The Policy Platform is binding on all Party members elected to public office and on the
Parliamentary Labour Party, the New Zealand Council and the Policy Council.
And that the new rule 146B be recommended for adoption at Annual Conference 2012
Good question!
The existing rule 302a already provides for disciplinary measures to be imposted against any member for: “contravention of the Principles, Rules and policies of the Party as contained in the current Constitution and policy documents of the Party;”
So as far as I’m concerned, new rule 146b is unnecessary.
However, I think it would take a fairly significant event to force the New Zealand Council to act on it. Existing rule 302c also provides for measures to be taken against members “standing as a candidate in opposition to, or publicly campaigning against [an officially selected Labour Parliamentary or local body candidate]“. In the 2010 local body campaign (and from what I understand, many times beforehand) this rule was broken in almost every place where a Labour candidate did stand, and there was no action taken.
“TTammany” Patrick? Let’s not get too optimistic about the Labour machine!