The Race Begins. Who will be Labour’s Candidate in 2022?
The jockeying for position has started. The Labour Party has announced that nominations can be submitted for the place as Labour’s Mayoral candidate in the 2022 local elections.
No sooner did the email arrive in the inboxes of Newham’s Labour Party membership, than another arrived, with a personal note from the Mayor (and a dozen colour photos of the same) showing the members how she was the right person to continue into a second term.
Unfortunately, while Labour’s members in Newham can stand for the post, they can’t vote. The decisions will be made by the party apparatchiks.
We hear that Brand:Rokhsana’s retinue have been sending out two unsubtle messages to those councillors who might be tempted to throw their hats into the ring.
The first is that Labour’s NEC will require that the candidate is a woman. So, give it up boys, there’s no future for you here. Given that Labour have not determined that there will be a Women-Only shortlist, we’re not sure how legal that is.
And, secondly, should any sitting councillors, (read cabinet members) stand then they will be out of a job and they should not come back crying at a later date.
Nonetheless, we hear that there are a number of councillors who feel that they can do a better job than the present incumbent. The next few weeks should be interesting, not least to see whether Labour in Newham will begin to tear apart at the seams.
There was a snippet that caused us to fall about with mirth. Far be it from us to suggest that Ms Fiaz is telling an untruth, but we did find the following implication a little difficult to believe.
“I am also delighted that the Party has responded to my request to open up the application process for Labour's Mayoral candidate, as I've always been an advocate for openness and transparency.”
You never know, it may be true, but then pigs might fly. It may well be that the highly principled incumbent asked for an ‘open selection’. And that she really, really didn’t want to be imposed, preferring instead to battle it out with other contestants in a free and fair election.
It might be.
Alternatively, it might be the case that she saw the writing on the wall and understood that, following the repeated scandals that dogged her administration, the NEC would be inviting other candidates to stand. A case of making a virtue of necessity.
Just how committed Ms Fiaz is/was to involving the membership in the selection might be judged by her refusal to join MP Stephen Timms and AM Unmesh Desai in their call for the members to be given a chance to vote for their candidate. More on this later.
We’ll go through her election statement in due course, but will probably wait for the other candidates to release theirs. Mayor Fiaz has stolen a march on any would-be rivals and got hers out to members within 24 hours of the commencement of the process, before most of the potential candidates knew that the race was starting. Nothing wrong there then.