Councillor Steve Battlemuch explains how the Government’s policy failings, combined with the national Party’s factional interference in local contests, is fracturing Labour in Nottinghamshire.

Nottingham made the political news last Thursday 30th October when five city Councillors left the ruling Labour Group to form a new group/party called the Nottingham Peoples Alliance (NPA). They joined forces with another ex-Labour Councillor to form a group of six and became the official opposition. Alongside these six there are two other Councillors who see themselves to the left of Labour – one in the Greens and one still an independent. All these eight were elected as Labour Councillors in May 2023.

So is this the beginning of the end for Labour control in Nottingham or a bump in the road based on some peculiar local circumstances? I’ll try to unpick this and answer some questions I’ve been asked over the last few days.

Is this split based on local or national issues?

The short answer is both.

Labour has controlled Nottingham City Council since 1988. This is partly the result of tight city boundaries which tend to favour a Labour vote, but also a result of the ruling Labour Group being one of the most organised in the country with weekly canvass sessions – on average at least four sessions a week! This has led to good voting intention data and an impressive record of regular publications and a strong ‘get out the vote’ operation. By contrast, other big cities have occasionally lost power to either the Lib Dems, the Tories or often to no overall control. So what has happened here and why now?

There was a left/right battle for leader in 2019 which I lost and another one in 2023 which another left candidate lost. Both results were very close which showed in reality the group was split almost 50/50 on political grounds.

The key change was in 2024 when the existing leader decided after five years he would stand down. Nominations opened and three candidates stood for leader. A week before the AGM was due to be held, the national Party intervened and stated a pre-interview process was needed and it would be run by a small group of people led by NEC member Gurinder Singh Josan. He was a leading light in the Labour First faction who backed Starmer and later that year was imposed as a candidate in a safe Labour seat for the July General Election.

In a surprise to absolutely no one, Josan and his appointed committee decided all candidates for the various internal elections for the group had failed the interview process apart from the candidates favoured by the Labour right. No feedback was ever given as to why candidates failed the interview process and there was no appeal process. It was the stitch-up of all stitch-ups and summed up what the Starmer-McSweeney Party was about.

This was compounded by a further decision to give the newly imposed leader a three- year term and the right to pick her own executive (the group had previously elected its own executive Councillors).

A year on in 2025, it was deemed that the Deputy Leader could be subject to election but another interview process popped up with the same outcome – no one was allowed to stand against the appointed imposed Deputy Leader. So it’s no surprise that there was discontent within the group – if you take away local democracy, don’t be shocked if people decide it’s not for them. Note too: all the above information is already in the public domain so I’m not breaking any confidentiality here. If we collectively don’t learn from mistakes, they will continue to be made.

Alongside this in a neighbouring local council – Broxtowe – something similar was playing out. A prominent Councillor there, Greg Marshall, had been the parliamentary candidate in 2017 and 2019. In the run-up to the selection process for the 2024 General Election, Greg was ruled out by a regional-national LP panel. Whatever reasons were given, everyone knew this was the Labour right asserting their power to keep a popular left candidate off the internal ballot for an election that he would clearly win – both the selection and General Election.

This was further compounded a year later by the decision to rule out Greg and others as potential candidates for the upcoming county council elections. This was despite Greg and others already being elected as District Councillors so there could be no pretence that they were not capable. In fact Greg was even the Deputy Leader of the District Council at the time. So in January 2025 Greg and 18 other Councillors in Broxtowe left en masse and formed a Broxtowe Alliance. This has been a bit of a beacon for some other disaffected Labour Councillors in other authorities in the Notts area and some have taken the opportunity to leave Labour as a result. The Nottingham City six are the biggest number after the Broxtowe 19. Maybe the Broxtowe split, alongside Zara Sultana leaving Labour, has brought this issue to a head in Nottingham.

So what are the national issues?

Well, the list is endless – Labour’s poor response to the Gaza conflict is often cited by many as a major error. It’s deeply felt in the Nottingham Muslim communities. Alongside this is the fact that the past 15 months of the new Labour government have been dominated by a rush to out-Reform the Farage surge. This is compounded by the notable battles around welfare and disability cuts and a general sense that the promise of ‘change’ hadn’t materialised.

Local councils – especially Labour ones – have faced years of austerity budget cuts. The effects of those cuts are still being felt. Some of them are still being implemented so local people are yet to see the benefit of the new government in terms of the services they get from their council. This all gives the ex-Labour Councillors plenty to shout about. There is some irony, however, that the split is happening at the same time as some of the budget pressures are easing with new investment in council services kicking in next year.

So is this the end of the defections or the beginning?

My gut feeling is that more will join them at some point. The issues that led to the split won’t go away. There is some real discontent in our communities about Labour’s stance on many issues and the rise of the Greens and the soon to be launched Corbyn-Sultana Your Party will add to the noise. Some may feel more at home politically in a safer space for left wing policies.

How the Labour bureaucracy locally and regionally handles the split also matters, in my opinion. If it doesn’t acknowledge some of the issues that led to this split and doubles down on an authoritarian approach to internal democracy, then I suspect more will leave over the next year. A key litmus test will be how it handles the issue of a labour official who has been abusive to one of the ex-Councillors in a message that has been made public. The same official was involved in a heated row that indirectly led to another Labour Councillor leaving the group a few months ago. Labour could – and should -be clear that this behaviour is unacceptable and if it does so quickly it would send a positive signal to some of the Councillors who might be tempted to jump ship. If it fails to do this, then that speaks volumes, because we all know what would happen to any left Councllor who was abusive – we would be suspended in an instant.

So where do I stand – will I stay or will I go?

Well, stop press – I wasn’t asked to join them! I found out about the launch on social media while on a brewery tour! It had clearly been planned for some time and for whatever reason they obviously felt I was too ingrained in Labour to consider this. They were probably right.

I’ve been in the Labour Party since 1982. I’ve seen many lows and some highs. I am probably as politically distant from the current national leadership as I’ve ever been in 43 years. I’ve been a Councillor for over 12 years but again it’s only in the last 18 months that I’ve not been allowed to elect my own leaders. Again, this is a real low point and treats backbench Councillors as voting fodder. I also share some of the criticisms of policy cited by the NPA in their launch but I’m still fighting inside the tent on these issues. Being able to implement policy – not just criticise others – is still important to me.

Maybe at the age of 63 I’ve not got the energy to start again with something new? I also do feel a sense of loyalty to the local Labour Party members in Wollaton West who selected me and the residents who have elected me four times as their local Councillor on a Labour ticket. If I changed parties I would feel the need to stand again under the new party banner but I’m not sure the residents would welcome a by-election and the costs it brings too.

I’m also yet to be convinced by the emergence of the Corbyn-Sultana party. I’m sure the NPA will end up joining that national party when its launched. I’m not ready to commit to that when I’ve spent my life trying to influence the Labour Party to be a progressive force. Yes, I know it’s not a progressive force at present! However it’s still got its organic links to the trade union movement, it’s still got socialist MPs that I admire and support, under the first past the post system it’s still the main vehicle for a left of centre party to be elected. I do accept that all this is in flux and any look at the left of centre parties in Europe and how they have collapsed shows it’s not guaranteed to remain the same forever. But I’m focused for now on some key things:

1. Getting more money for local councils and reintroducing some of the services that have been cut in the past 15 years.
2. Getting a new council structure – a larger council based on a greater Nottingham footprint – as I’m convinced it’s what we need,, going forward for long after I’m no longer here.
3. Stopping the march of the far right – from Tommy Robinson’s thugs to the suited Farage – the prospect of a Trump-like future for the UK should be enough to frighten progressives and make us organise better together to make sure this isn’t the outcome of the 28-29 general election.
4. So staying and fighting for these things inside the Labour tent is where I’m at now.

So that’s my (over-long) take on where I think we are at. Politics can change quickly and who knows what local and national politics will look like next May after elections in Wales, Scotland and some councils. I’m sure I’ll blog again about this in the future.

Finally, I write this on the day of the election for the new Mayor of New York City. It’s inspiring to see a socialist there standing for the Democrats and hopefully set to win despite the barrage of crap thrown at him by Trump, Musk and others. So good luck Zohran Mamdani – may your (expected) victory be a beacon to progressives across the US and elsewhere. Stop press – he won!

 Steve Battlemuch is a Labour Councillor for the city of Nottingham. He writes in a personal capacity. This blog originally appeared here.

Image: Nottingham. https://www.flickr.com/photos/billy_wilson/49847991223 Creator: Billy Wilson Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 2.0 Generic CC BY-NC 2.0 Deed