Blogorama V: Politics for People

[To find out more about the Co-operative Party visit their website. Membership is only £15, with a reduced rate of £5 for young members (under 26), you can join here.]

As you may or may not know several of us here at the Labour Club are not just members of labour, we are also members of the Co-operative Party. And since the Scottish Co-operative Party Council is this Saturday in Glasgow I thought it would be appropriate to have a Co-operative blog as the subject of Blogorama V.

Politics for People in their own words:

Unofficially blogging for the Co-operative Party, part of the global co-operative movement. We work with the Labour Party to influence its policies towards more co-operative solutions.

We believe in individual empowerment and self-help. We believe that a better share of this planet's wealth between Northern and Southern hemispheres and a greater respect for our environment will help us build a sustainable, safer and progressive society.

I hope that you'll agree that those are extremely laudable goals to pursue and values to promote.

As has been said here before, the current economic situation, caused in large part by the recklessness of profit seeking corporations, is a clear demonstration of the benefits of mutuality. Of companies that are held responsible for their actions by the people whose money allows them to operate in the first place. Politics for People recently reported on the Co-operative Party in Wales launching a document concerning the recent credit crunch (emphasis mine):

Yesterday the Co-operative Party and Wales 20:20 launched a new document, "Co-operative Values in a Credit Crunch Wales". "Difficult times call for new ways of thinking" is the key message from the authors, Karen Wilkie and Robbie Erbmann of the Co-operative Party. With co-ops and building societies, not least Principality Building Society, thriving and attracting new customers, they put forward a vision of a Welsh economy remade with co-operative values.

Huw Lewis AM, a Labour Co-operative Assembly Member, wrote the foreword for the pamphlet, saying, "I’ve been a proud member of the Co-operative Party for over 20 years, and the proposals in this pamphlet explain why. The movement has never stopped bringing forward radical, yet workable ideas. With the onset of the recession policy makers have a duty to look closely at these excellent proposals which underline co-operative values, matching innovation with pragmatism."

One point I think cannot be emphasised enough is the success of Co-operatives in the current economic climate. Their responsible and ethical business practices have kept them away from the massive losses (and subsequent bailouts) of the banks.

Politics for People also cover the Co-operative Party's campaigns, including Plan Bee [which we also posted about] the Co-operative Party's brand new campaign to arrest a worrying decline in bee numbers:

The bee is the symbol of the Co-op's membership and, more importantly, a major part of the ecosystem and our food producing system. A third of the food we eat is pollinated by bees. So the news that bees are declining in numbers fast is a major threat to agriculture. It was the subject of a debate at last year's Co-operative Party conference, but hasn't yet hit the headlines. It's time it did.

To address the disturbing issue of bees dying out, The Co-operative - Britain's biggest farmer - has launched Plan Bee. They have launched a ten-point plan to save bees and a campaign where we can all get involved.

I'd like to stress that last sentence, "a campaign where we can all get involved", because I think it illustrates one of the major characteristics of the Co-operative Party and co-operative groups in general, the involvement of members, and in every facet of the organisation and decision making processes of a group. This structure makes co-operative groups more accountable, and thus more prudent in their actions. A characteristic that would benefit a lot of ordinary people if it was spread to more businesses. [If you agree you can join the Co-operative Party and makes this a reality.]

Through its People's Rail campaign the Co-operative Party have worked hard to incorporate a responsible and accountable structure for the governance of Network Rail. As posted here:

This week saw Network Rail's AGM. It was a big milestone in our People's Rail campaign. The Co-operative Party has been calling for a review of the company's governance, and for that review to give the public more power and hold the various levels of governance to account. There was a motion put up by a small number of the members of Network Rail which called for a review: "that members establish a governance 'Review Group' to consider the effectiveness of company's corporate governance practices, with particular reference to the accountability of the Board to its members and of its members to the company’s wider stakeholders."

We knew there would be strong opposition, even though a regular review of governance is difficult to oppose. After all, the UN, the EU and the NHS are among the institutions doing so. But we hoped that the AGM had taken note of the public, politicians and the press who had supported the People's Rail campaign.

And so it turned out, to our great pleasure. Against the odds, members narrowly backed the motion (all other votes were won overwhelmingly). It's good to see that the senior team, who according to reports opposed the motion, have accepted the result graciously and have welcomed the chance to consider the future structure of Network Rail.

The Chair of the Co-operative Party Parliamentary Group, Sarah-McCarthy-Fry MP, made it clear that the campaign will continue until we get the right result for passengers: "This decision represents a vindication of the People's Rail campaign. However, we have to remember this is just the first step of many. Network Rail is still a long way from being accountable to passengers and the public. We will continue this campaign until it is."

If you want a better run rail network in which companies are responsbile for their failings, and the users of the service have a say in what that service should provide then you should learn more about the People's Rail campaign and I would strongly recommend that you consider joining the Co-operative Party.

The best way to progress as people, and as a nation, and as an international community, is through mutual co-operation and making sure that those with large degrees of power are accountable to the majority who don't

Blogorama IV: John's Labour Blog

[Just a note this might seem a little (or very) incoherent but that's because it's end of term time and I have quite a few things to do.]

After last week's jaunt into the world of Feminist blogging today we return to the true substance of Blogorama; Labour blogging.

The subject of this week's Blogorama is the personal blog of trade union activist and Labour Party member John Gray. (There are some here who will be interested to note that he has an interest in the History of Labour)

John works for UNISON, for those who aren't familiar with the organisation, in his words:

UNISON is the largest Housing union in the UK. We have members in Council housing departments, ALMOs, Registered social landlords (Housing associations) and the supported housing sector. But also our 1.4 million members are either homeowners or tenants themselves or in need of affordable housing.

He covers a variety of Labour related issues, quite a few of them to do with UNISON. He covered the same 10 point refutal of the criticism of public pensions that we covered. I like to see Labour bloggers working in harmony to get the message out.

He made a video explaining the sub-prime crisis which some might find interesting:



Like me, John appreciates the importance of Europe, in a recent post he raised some very relevant points for Labour regarding next years European elections. [Claude is Claude Moraes, a London MEP who was the second guest speaker at the London Region Labour Link meeting that John had attended.]

However the socialist and progressive majority in Europe is razor thin. If not enough Labour MEPs are elected then the assembly could fall into the hands of EU “Conservatives” and this will mean the end of such progressive policies. It is also critical for the unions to support Labour MEPs so they can oppose the dark side of the EU legislative regime, such as the “Services Directorate” which could result in the forced privatisation of local government and NHS care services.

Claude also warned that the likely collapse of the UKIP (due in part to their corruption scandals and the behaviour of their maverick MEPs) could result in the BNP getting 7% of the vote in London and gaining a MEP.

Currently he is involved in a serious, and especially from a blogging perspective disheartening, situation involving an article he posted on Labourhome. He is being sued for libel by a former Labour Party member (Now a Tory via Respect and the Communist Party). The situation is covered well by this postby David Osler who is involved in the same case. At the heart of the case is freedom of speech online and in particular who is responsible for repercussions of comments on a website or forum. Comments made on the post which is at the heart of the libel case have been cited:

Comments left on the original post form part of the action, something that in itself raises important issues for freedom of speech on the internet. One of the grounds on which this action is being brought is a remark in this blog's comments box that describes Ms Kaschke as 'one cherry short of a Schwarzwalderkirschtorte'. The merit of this designation is now entirely a matter for the court; however, such deliberations can scarcely be considered the optimal use of judicial time.

As most blogging aficionados will realise, such a lighthearted and jocular insult is nothing compared to the anarchic mêlée of a controversial thread in full flight. Everyone - regardless of political affiliation - who values the right to express an opinion online in vernacular English should support all of the bloggers involved in this blizzard of writs.

Whilst I don't believe that people should be allowed to defame others at will I am very uneasy with the use of litigation to stifle criticism. Especially since Labourhome deleted the offending article and offered the litigant space on the front page to air their side of the story. I think it's very important that the issue of freedom of speech on the internet is tackled otherwise many more bloggers could end up being dragged into court and face large legal bills even if they win.

I hope you enjoy reading this week's featured blog and look forward to reading next week's Blogorama; Blogorama V. Which will be on Christmas Eve.

Human Rights Day/Blogoroma III: Feministing

I don't know how many of you knew it but today was the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration Of Human Rights. If you're interested you can read the declaration in its entirety (Which I recommend as it's a very inspiring document) here.

(Also in Gàidhlig Albanach here and Cesky here.)

I thought that since today is also Blogorama Day^TM I would highlight a blog which offered some coverage of the event. It's a bit of a departure from the main focus of blogorama, that is to cover Labour bloggers, but I'm tired and so you'll just have to settle this week for one of my favourite blogs, Feministing.

Feministing is a feminist (Duh!) blog written by a group of very talented young female bloggers. They cover a range of issues related to gender equality and women's rights. What I especially appreciate is their focus beyond their own sphere to look at gay rights and racial issues as well. They are always very frank about some of the more unfortunate issues related to historical feminism, specifically the focus of most feminism being on the rights of white women and ignoring the situation of other ethnicities.

The main author behind Feministing is Jessica Valenti, who as well as being the found of Feministing is also an excellent author. She has released two books on the issue feminism (Both of which I naturally own.); Full Frontal Feminism and He's a Stud, She's a Slut and 49 Other Double Standards Every Woman Should Know.

She now has a third book in the pipeline, The Purity Myth: How America's Obsession with Virginity is Hurting Young Women , which focuses on the US's incredibly creepy "Purity" balls.

If you think I'm being harsh by calling the things creepy you really need to read this quote taken from the article:

But first...a creepy anecdote.

Kylie Miraldi has come from California to celebrate her 18th birthday tonight. She'll be going to San Jose State on a volleyball scholarship next year. Her father, who looks a little like Superman, is on the dance floor with one of her sisters; he turns out to be Dean Miraldi, a former offensive lineman with the Philadelphia Eagles. When Kylie was 13, her parents took her on a hike in Lake Tahoe, Calif. "We discussed what it means to be a teenager in today's world," she says. They gave her a charm for her bracelet--a lock in the shape of a heart. Her father has the key. "On my wedding day, he'll give it to my husband," she explains. "It's a symbol of my father giving up the covering of my heart, protecting me, since it means my husband is now the protector. He becomes like the shield to my heart, to love me as I'm supposed to be loved."

Paging Dr. Freud!

I think even Freud would be creeped out by that...

Anyway back on topic. They covered Human Rights Day with an article highlighting the work done by human right's campaigners around the world to improve their own communities. I think that that's something we can all appreciate and respect.

From Feministing:

Today is the anniversary of the passage of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:

Sixty years on, we pay tribute to the extraordinary vision of the Declaration's original drafters and to the many human rights defenders around the world who have struggled to make their vision a reality.

The Declaration belongs to each and every one of us - read it, learn it, promote it and claim it as your own.

During its "16 Days" series, MADRE, an amazing international women's rights organization, has been posting some great examples on their blog of women around the world who are taking this to heart.

In Kenya, women established a village called Umoja ("unity") where violence against women is prohibited.

In Colombia, in communities threatened by violence from military and paramilitary groups, a group called LIMPAL works to support displaced women and their families.

In Sudan, women have created a farmer's union to allow them to demand government support for their agricultural projects.

It's important to remember that Human Rights Day isn't about calling on other countries to honor basic human rights. It's about working for those rights in our own communities.

There's one common thread that connects these disparate groups of people, and that's co-operation. (I think it links nicely back to the post I made earlier about Unions.) When people work together we can achieve great things, our diverse skills and experiences add up to make an incredibly effective whole, which when channeled in a positive manner can effect great changes and move us towards a more equal society for everyone. That's what makes these community groups flourish, and it's what makes Labour so great.

Blogorama II: Though Cowards Flinch

“We all know what happens to those who stand in the middle of the road — they get run down.” - Aneurin Bevan

For the second Blogorama we're covering a blog run by a group of young bloggers called "Though Cowards Flinch". They write very intelligent and thought provoking articles on a variety of political subjects. For example here skewering the Right's ridiculous use of political correctness:

More and more it seems that the term “politically correct” is a bludgeon to be arbitrarily wielded against the entire Left, simply by virtue of being Left. The wonder of the whole thing is the implicit manner in which this construct of faulty reasoning is attempted: lefties are against hunting so it is politically incorrect. Lefties are scroungers, so having a job is politically incorrect. Lefties love abortion, so opposing it is politically incorrect.

Miles uses ‘political correctness’ at one point as a means of referring to toeing a line of consensus, in which case all creeds of politics are in some form guilty of political correctness and the term becomes essentially meaningless. She also uses it in the ideological sense mentioned above, reducing it to a doctrinaire battle-cry for the Right. No doubt the woolly thinking of Miles hasn’t considered quite so deeply this question, since beside such vacuous utterances on political correctness, she can record how she hates that Palin’s daughter is a cheerleader.

As a feminist I particularly appreciate their articles on gender issues, and I'm sure that those West Wing fans in the Labour Club will appreciate the reference in their recent article on polling.

From a blogging perspective they seem to hold the same goals as this blog; to create a community of bloggers, and to improve the efficiency of the disbursement of information by the Labour Party, and to raise the level of participation of members. The internet holds a myriad of opportunities to draw people together and allow people to interact without the logistical difficulties of time and place. It also a fantastic tool to teach people about our ideals, goals and achievements and in the process increase our supporter base and fundraising potential.

They make these points and more in this about on the use of "New Media". An especially vexing problem for bloggers, especially as compared to traditional media outlets which have large staffs and fact finders spread all around the country, is their difficulty in being able to get information about industrial disputes and other important events across the country. It is this fundamental stumbling block that can be overcome by the simple means of co-operation between bloggers in geographically disperse bloggers. However saying it can be overcome belies the difficulty of effectively co-ordinating a large group of people all of whom have differing levels of information and time available to participate. It is this difficulty that I hope to tackle working for the Scottish Labour Students Committee.

This spirit of co-operativity is summed up best in the penultimate paragraph:

These are some of the opportunities offered by heightened communication between bloggers and by the additional technology open to us through Web 2.0. I’d like the opinion of some of my fellow bloggers on just these subjects, so I’m going to tap Peter Kenyon, Mil, Paul [That's last week's blogorama subject and the person who suggested Though Cowards Flinch], Susan, Tom, Stroppybird and Penny for their own comments or articles, because I think each of them will have a distinctive point of view ranging from those of feminists to community activists to internet-lovers to ideologically aware Marxists. Also, The Yorkshire Ranter seems to have given this some thought already.

They also covered some of the same stories as this blog, take for example the releasing of the BNPs list of racist wankers members; here and there.

So why not head over there and see what you think for yourself. On a final note I found Though Cowards Flinch through being recommended it by a poster in the comments of last weeks blogorama, if anyone else has ideas for blogs we can cover or just interesting blogs in general please do tell us.

The Labour Blogosphere: Blogorama I

I believe that Labour is the best party to lead Britain. I'm sure that a lot of people reading this agree with me. However, not everyone does. That's why communication of ideas and campaigning are so important in politics. The ability to reach out and affect the thinking of voters, and to persuade people to support you is key to any political campaign. During Barack Obama's year long campaign for the White House he was supremely successful at building up a grassroots network of supporters and fundraisers using the internet.

At the next general election, and especially as time goes by at future elections, the internet will play a far greater role in informing people about the policies of the Labour party, what we have achieved in office, and what we plan to do in the future. And that is what this post is about; using the internet to transmit ideas, mostly via blogging but also through e-mail and video.

At the Labour homepage you can access membersnet the homepage for members of the Labour Party. Here you can browse a directory of members' blogs. I think that the widespread involvement of members in actively discussing politics is something to be encouraged. So every Wednesday from now I intend, conditions permitting, to introduce the readers here to a new Labour blog. This new weekyl segment is to be called Blogorama.

For the inaugural Blogorama we are going to visit the remote, rarely travelled reaches of darkest West Lancashire, specifically the town of Bickerstaffe. The blog in question is the Bickerstaffe Record, which is written by the local Labour Councillor, a man whose supreme intellect and refined tastes are shown by the fact that he has read posts and commented on this very blog. ("One month on" and "Why do we do it?" for those who are curious.)

In particular I wish to draw your attention to a very good post he did in the last few days about unemployment figures. A topic which may seem very dry, but is of the utmost importance not just to those who have unfortunately lost their jobs, or are in danger of unemployment, due to the current global economic problems, but also to those of us that wish to refute the untruths propagated by the Tories and others. Specifically that the current economic situation is as bad as, or getting to be as bad as, it got during Thatcher's time in office.

"IT ISN’T! THE WAY UNEMPLOYMENT IS MEASURED HAS CHANGED, roughly by the same proportions that we changed from inches to centimetres, but which didn’t mean we suddenly got people who were 20 feet tall."

That quote from the blog links back to a previous post he did on the subject which explains what the problem is with regards to the reporting of unemployment figures:

"The BBC, then, carries as it’s headline figure the unemployment total (end of September) of 1.82 million. Responsibly enough, it also quotes the latest claimant count at 98,900, but this latter figure is likely to get less coverage in days to come as the media focuses in on the higher figure.

It’s important first to make the difference between the two figures clear. The unemployment figure (1.82 million) is based on the International Labour Organisation definition, which the incoming Labour government said it would use when it came into power in 1997. It is measured by the Labour Force Survey of (from memory 57,000)households, and even though it is based on a sample and there open to samplinig differences, it is generally reckoned to give a more accurate representation of unemployment because it measures the number of people who ‘want to work, are available to work, and are actively seeking employment’, whatever their benefit status (including those not claiming benefit).

As such, it is generally considered more accurate than the ‘claimant count’, which is simply the number of people seeking unemployment-related benefit, as well as being comparable internationally. For a summary of the differences between the two measures see here.

The important point is that the Conservatives used the less accurate claimant count when they were in government. Thus, when we talk about the ‘1 in 10′ jobless figure of the mid 1980s, we are referring to 3 million people on the claimant count alone. The ILO figure was much higher."

The Tories would like people to believe that Labour's strong record on the economy (In large part thanks to our extremely capable Chancellors) is not as solid as it seems. They aim to do this by their manipulation of statistics to make labour's record seem as dismal as their own, but as this post so ably demonstrated that just isn't the case. One of the major differences between Labour and the Tories as I noted in the post yesterday is the manner in which we react to unemployment and insecurity in the job market. We do something about it, the Tories simply close the shutters and sit snugly in the warm whilst those left in the cold have to fend for themselves.

Recently when John Prescott was in Aberdeen he gave an excellent speech about campaigning which was attended by members of the Labour Club. One of the things he stressed was getting the truth out about Labour's record in government. That's what this post from the Bickerstaffe Record does. It may not have the readership of a national newspaper but it is directed and engages with local people. All we need is a blogger in each constituency providing direct and accurate information about all that Labour has achieved and all we can achieve and to refute Tory and SNP misinformation, and we can make sure that we are ready for 21st Century campaigning, and we can make sure that we are ready to Go 4th and win again.