Fiaz Re-Selected as Labour Mayoral Candidate

The NEC has spoken. Rokhsana Fiaz was re-selected as the candidate who will contest the mayoralty in the local elections in May.

It seems that the Labour Party has forgotten the lessons of the not-so-distant past. Take Hull for instance. Once it was a Labour stronghold in which seemed impregnable. The residents were taken for granted and over the course of a couple of elections, Labour lost control of the council.

Or look at Scotland. Once the Scots returned 70 Labour MPs to Westminster. Again, the party took them for granted and now Labour is lucky to return a handful of Scots MPs.

Or look at The Red Wall. It crumbled to an inept and dare we say narcissistic old-Etonian who doesn’t seem to own a hair brush, because Labour had taken the people for granted.

We understand that in a last-minute intervention to avert a disaster, local MPs Lyn Brown and Stephen Timms met with Labour General Secretary, David Evans. Clearly, they were unsuccessful.

 So, Labour will enter the 2022 local election campaign with the following record.

  • Council Tax rises every year.

  • Inept financial management

  • Broken Promises on parking and massive hikes in the costs of residential parking

  • Failure to build the council homes that she promised

  • Anger at the way local traffic free zones were introduced

  • Allegations of bullying against staff and council colleagues

  • Antisemitism across the party and the Labour Group

  • Both CLPs suspended

  • 1000+ members suspended or expelled

  • Alienation of her former supporters

  • Indecision

  • Distrust at a candidate who entered the 2018 race stating that she wanted to abolish the mayoralty and then voted to protect her pay packet

  • Anger at high profile CUTS, such as the City Farm

  • Anger at record levels of rubbish and fly-tipping

  • Dog whistle politics on Palestine

  • A swing to the Tories of 22% in the East Ham Central by-election

Fiaz had something like 70% of the vote in 2018. How much will she retain in 2022?

We suspect that there will be the first serious challenge to Labour since 2006, from disaffected Left leaning ex-members. Our prediction is that her former supporter and now, ex-Labour member Mehmood Mirza will stand in opposition to Fiaz. It is not beyond the realms of possibility that this largely Muslim Left-leaning group would invite George Galloway to throw his hat in the ring.

As to whether either candidate would have a chance winning, probably not this time. But if they took 30% of the vote, this would come from votes that Labour had historically believed to be ‘theirs’. A high-profile candidate with a good campaign might conceivably take more.

Labour has shown contempt for the people of Newham. The cost is likely to be in votes.

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Two Newham Councillors Resign the Whip in Protest at Reselection of Rokhsana Fiaz; “An Unfit Person to Hold Office”

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Is Labour Blind to the Threats Locally?