“Some of us are born to be John the Baptist” says Mr Phillips.
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“Some of us are born to be John the Baptist” says Mr Phillips.
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6 comments ↓
Hi Tom,
I hope you and your family are in good health.
This the first time I am leaving any comments on anyone’s blog, but it is a situation of which I have personal experience and feel strongly about.
I agree with some of the points Phillips makes in his article. Like him I would never endorse all black shortlists and, like Phillips, I do believe that the Labour Party, of which I have been and continue to be an active member for a good number of years, is institutionally racist.
I have been a member of the Panel of Candidates for about 5 years. Some of my personal experiences have been:
Not all candidates on the Panel are notified of selection meetings.
On the occasions I have gone to selection meetings, I have been told by branch members that whilst being ‘by far the best candidate’, the meeting had been told who to vote for before the selection took place. On other occasions, when I had expressed an interest in seats after learning about them through the ‘grapevine’. I was told not to bother because “I want a white woman” , “the seat has been earmarked for the Secretary of the local MP”, the seat had “already been promised to an ex-councillor”.
In all these cases I have known the name of the successful candidate well in advance of the selection process taking place.
This is a flavour of my personal experience. I believe that those who have been complicite in such discriminatory practice should be ashamed of their actions.
I see, this week, that Harriet Harman has been speaking about female candidates from BME communities and also that Baroness Uddin is Chairing a working group on a similar subject. I would be more than happy for you to pass my details on to them and am willing to share my experiences personally.
Best wishes,
Parminder x
And the Labour Party has done precisely diddly squat about complaints like those Parminder mentions here. So whilst I have little time for Trevor Phillips and his continual self-promotion there is a case to answer by the political establishment who conspire to allow this sort of thing to happen. Labour have made some advances in promoting black and asian councillors… as long as they aretheir kind of black and asian councillors, not those who want to think for themselves. And so often the candidates are selected from those who will keep the faith communities happy.
Way to go yet, Tom.
Still, the funniest part of the interview with John the Baptist was the suggestion that he was the man who has perhaps come closest to being Britain’s Obama. Pull the other one!
I suspect New Labour has had to do this to stay New Labour, no good allowing local parties and constituencies to pick real Labour would it. We have one of Blair’s Ladies with us. Hand picked by Blair himself, sadly she is now running around telling us she only came into politics to help people she is a socialist, that word is used cheap these days Socialist and socialism.
A British Barack Obama would have not get very far because he would have been subject to nasty, character assassinating, articles in the British press, like this one:
http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=10043
Written by… er… Trevor Philips
Do people still listen to Trevor Phillips?
I’d suggest “one”. And I’d suggest his name is “John the Baptist”.
Sorry, but it was asking for it.
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