Trigger ballot in Hove: Email to members of Brighton & Hove Momentum
A trigger ballot has been announced for party branches in Hove & Portslade constituency.
Here are the details:
Brunswick & Adelaide & Central Hove — 11am, Saturday 2 November 2019, main hall, BHASVIC, 205 Dyke Rd, Hove BN3 6EG
Goldsmid & Hove Park — 9am, Saturday 2 November 2019, main hall, BHASVIC, 205 Dyke Rd, Hove BN3 6EG
Hangleton & Knoll — Saturday 9 November 2019, CityCoast Centre, North St, Portslade BN41 1DG
Portslade — Saturday 9 November 2019, CityCoast Centre, North St, Portslade BN41 1DG
Wish & Westbourne — Saturday 9 November 2019, CityCoast Centre, North St, Portslade BN41 1DG
For full details, check the email from your branch which should have arrived or be arriving soon.
This is an important vote for party democracy and we urge all Labour Party members in Hove & Portslade to attend their branch’s ballot meeting. It’s important to arrive on time and advisable to bring your Labour party membership card. You must have been a Labour Party member for six months on the 3rd of October (ie joined before 5 April 2019).
We are also seeking volunteers to help Momentum’s campaign for ‘Open Selection’ in Brighton & Hove. To find out more, please contact us at team@brightonhovemomentum.org, or via the Momentum — Brighton & Hove Facebook page (@MomentumBrighton).
And in case you’re not quite sure what it all means, here’s a discussion of it: https://youtu.be/XRCfjNUoAsE
Or, read…
B&H Momentum’s Trigger Ballot FAQ
Trigger ballot? What’s that then?
A trigger ballot is a vote held before a general election, in constituencies where this already a Labour MP who wants to stand again. The local party has to ‘opt in’ to selecting a candidate for the next election. If the threshold for opting in is not passed, the sitting MP automatically becomes the candidate and the
So it doesn’t mean we get rid our current MP?
No. It just means there will be a selection process. Peter needn’t be so worried about a bit of party democracy.
But that’s what this is about really though isn’t it — deselecting Peter Kyle?
No, that’s for local members to decide. But to do that they need the chance to have a reasoned debate, and crucially, to find out about any other candidates!
Yeah, I was going to ask that. Who are the alternative candidates?
There aren’t any. No-one is allowed to ‘campaign as if they were a candidate’ before the trigger ballot. So anyone who might want to stand isn’t allowed to announce it. Members are effectively being asked to vote on whether Peter is so good as a candidate that no-one could possibly be better! Who knows what great new candidates with new and inspiring ideas might come forward, given the chance?
But he is pretty popular and good as a campaigner isn’t he?
We don’t know, certainly not because a handful of vocal fans (or friends) say so in the Argus comments or on Facebook. We do know that MPs tend to overstate their personal vote, which is actually only ever a few percent at most. People vote for a party, not a candidate. Some MPs do better than others because they have better publicity machine or are better funded. Maybe branches should include that in their deliberations. But that’s where the merits of Peter’s case should be discussed — in the branches who know their electorate, in a selection meeting, when the other potential candidates are known.
But we need the best chance of winning — any Labour MP is better than a Tory, surely?
Yes.
So shouldn’t we just wave him through — I mean he won a Tory seat against the national swing in 2015, and then got a whacking majority in 2017?
Well, it wasn’t a solid Tory seat — it’s changed hands quite a bit — and the result wasn’t ‘against the swing’ in England. In 2017 he got a big majority — amidst the biggest swing to Labour since 1945 — but then the Tory candidate did suffer a huge homophobia scandal, so all this is arguable. The point is, these arguments need to be looked into in detail in branches. Members shouldn’t just accept these received truths and decide they make candidate selection pointless.
But maybe it’s not just pointless, but actually damaging! Won’t a contest cause party disunity and give rise to unfavourable press stories?
NO! Quite the opposite. The local press is already writing stories based solely on the most blood-curdling exchanges it can trawl up from Facebook! We should be asking not ‘how do we preserve party unity’ but ‘how do we resolve party disunity’? It’s no secret that opinions on Peter are in many ways quite polarised. A substantial section on each side is not going to change its mind. So we need some kind of dispute resolution — a way to decide the matter fairly. And that is to have a genuine selection process. If Peter wins it fair and square, having made the case that he is indeed Labour’s best candidate for this election, it becomes much harder for people to moan about him or claim his candidacy is illegitimate. The overwhelming majority of members would accept the result and get behind the winner.
But wouldn’t a selection contest involve criticism and risk damaging the candidate?
No — negative campaigning is not allowed — and everyone knows that getting confrontational always backfires. In reality, a selection meeting would be civil, constructive and a great celebration of political ideas. Research has shown that the public responds well at the ballot box to a party showing it is democratic. The party — and Peter — needs to put aside the idea that this is a negative process. Healthy competition and an engaging debate, with a platform that can gain positive press, and a candidate — Peter, or some as yet unknown new star — who can go into the general election fresh from winning a genuine selection contest! What’s not to like?
Yeah but, winning a trigger ballot would be just as good a boost wouldn’t it, and just as good as a way of providing a mandate for unity?
Nope. There is little boost from a vote to timidly do nothing for fear of disturbing the status quo. As for unity, a trigger ballot is likely to be quite close — and without other potential candidates or the discussion of policy and strategy they would stimulate, it would be a decision made on gut feeling, without proper debate or full information. Quite similar to the Brexit vote, in fact…hardly a unifying event.
Well I’m still unsure about this. Wouldn’t the best bet just be to vote against selection, in case something bad happens?
No. The best bet is to keep your options open, find out who else comes forward, and if you think Peter Kyle is the best bet all things considered, you can give him a proper, positive endorsement.
