Bryn Griffiths argues that the current Labour National Policy Forum nominations and elections may turn out to be a lot more important than you might think.  Read on to find out why the candidates who get elected to sit on this low-key body may suddenly find themselves in a pivotal role when Labour is back in office.

Many Labour Party members are hoping that Starmer in Government will prove to be a bit more of a radical affair than the extremely cautious phenomenon we have experienced so far.  At the very least, members are hoping for a repeat that reaches the rather modest benchmark set by New Labour recorded in the ever-present social media meme below.

The big problem is that radical economists such as James Medway are telling us that, given Reeves’ and Starmer’s self-imposed fiscal straitjacket, even this modest list might turn out to be beyond reach. James argued in an article for Novara Media that “Labour… remains committed to further austerity after the next election. Its flagship £28bn-a-year green spending promise was unceremoniously ditched.”

If the economists are right, history suggests that, at some point, Labour’s leadership will start to face trade union affiliates and Constituency Labour Parties in a more rebellious and expectant mood.  If you want to learn a bit more about the close historical relationship between the revival of the Labour left’s fortunes and Labour austerity in government, take a look at my piece Fighting Neo-Liberalism since 1973 written for the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy’s 2023 Conference Bulletin and republished on Labour Outlook.  Former Corbyn adviser, Simon Fletcher, also  took up the same theme arguing in a recent edition of Byline Times that ““A Keir Starmer Government Will Trigger a Revival of the Labour Left’.

What is the National Policy Forum?

What has all this got to do with Labour’s National Policy Forum (NPF) elections?  To understand that, we need to go all the way back to the last century and understand why Blair used the Partnership into Power Process to establish a National Policy Forum in the first place.  Ann Black, the Labour National Executive Committee veteran took to the pages of Labour List,  back in 2018, to give us her take on the NPF’s history:

“The Forum was formally established in the wake of Tony Blair’s 1997 landslide. The aim was to ensure that party and government stayed in tune, campaigning and winning further elections, rather than falling prey to internal feuding. This would be achieved through consensual, deliberative policy-making, rather than polarising resolutions and public confrontations.” 

If you think that doesn’t sound too bad, Ann then went on to describe what really happened:

“In fact, the process leading to a manifesto platform involved much old-style manoeuvring. Crunch meetings lasted until the early morning, and consensus was sometimes not so much won as enforced: proposed amendments were diluted in negotiations with ministers, or defeated. Throughout the Blair and Brown years I was part of a small minority who pressed for conference to have the final say on pensions, benefits, taxes, selective education, Trident and much else – and we lost every time.” 

Given the historical precedent described by Ann Black and Starmer’s taste for a top-down style of Party management, it is likely that the National Policy Forum will be used as a pressure valve to avoid radical policy alternatives ever being debated at Labour Party Conference.  The key to the Constituency left’s revival will be to  construct an alliance with the trade unions as they start to try and flex their muscles during the first term of a Starmer-led Labour Government.  To play a role during that important moment, we must win some places in the National Policy Forum Elections to quite literally be in the room when it starts to get interesting.  Our aim is to work with the constituencies, the trade unions and affiliated organisations to give our popular Conference policies a loud hearing.

If you are still sceptical about the likelihood of this scenario, you need only look back to July 2023 to see a dress rehearsal for what such disputes might look like. Unite gave Labour’s National Policy Forum document the ‘thumbs down’, “as it clearly crossed the union’s red lines. This included around workers’ rights in collective bargaining – an area which needs root and branch change, not just tinkering around the edges – as well as workers’ access to unions and a weakening of language around zero hours contracts.” 

Try and imagine what it might be like when we have at last kicked out the Tories and Starmer is in Government. That is why we need a team of socialists from the constituencies to work with the unions in the National Policy Forum meetings.

What do I do?

I am standing alongside Party members across the country as part of the Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance supported by Momentum and the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy.  Together we can form a socialist team to give popular Conference policies a voice within the National Policy Forum, but first we need Constituency Labour Party nominations.

Nominating procedures may vary depending on your Constituency Labour Party (CLP), but here is how you can nominate us:

1. Contact your local CLP secretary and ask them to confirm the process for your CLP to make a nomination for Labours’ National Policy Forum elections and the date of your next CLP meeting. 2. Contact your CLP or Borough Labour Party Chair and Secretary with the following text giving 7 days’ notice before the next members’ meeting.    “Dear ……………………… At the upcoming CLP meeting I would like to nominate the following candidates for our Regional Constituency Reps on the National Policy Forum. [Add names]. [You can find all your regional Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance candidates across the whole country  here]. 3. Find another supporter of the Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance in your CLP to ‘second’ the nomination. Members can ‘second’ your nomination from the floor on the day.   4. Speak to local members and encourage them to attend the CLP meeting with you to support the Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance (CLGA) slate, and share our statements with them. All our statements are on the Labour Party website here alongside all our opponents.  In this link are all the left CLGA candidates  here.   5. Attend your CLP meeting and propose the nomination formally, alongside the seconder.   6. If you are successful make sure your secretary includes each nominees Labour Party Membership number which is in each statement here.

When making your nominations you might wish to nominate the whole Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance regional team or just one or two that your local Party might know about.

The Timetable

The table below is the timetable for the nominations and elections.

EVENT	DATE
Nominations close	12 noon, Friday 28 June 2024
Ballots	July/August 2024

The procedure to make nominations for the National Executive Committee, Labour’s ruling national body,  is almost identical and Jess Barnard explains the process for these even more important elections here.

Bryn Griffiths is standing in the National Policy Forum CLP Representatives  Eastern Region Division 1.  He is standing as part of the Centre-Left Grassroots Alliance team but the article above is his personal view of the importance of the elections.

Bryn is also the host of Labour Hub’s spin off the Labour Left Podcast.  He is an activist in the labour movement, Momentum and The World Transformed in North Essex. Bryn writes regularly for Labour Hub. You can find all the episodes of the Labour left Podcast here  or if you prefer audio platforms (e.g. Amazon, Audible Spotify, Apple etc,) just search for Labour Left Podcast.

Image: c/o author.