Carol Hayton reports on the Labour conference
We would like to thank all those that supported our conference motion on housing this year. Housing was the topic that received the largest number of submissions to the priorities ballot from CLPs. Over 20 of them submitted our model motion, or a version of it, and a further 20 or so CLPs submitted motions on other housing related matters. We were incredulous, therefore, when the results of the priority ballot were declared and Housing only achieved 7th place, well behind the top 6 topics that made it onto the conference agenda.
Amongst these was one with a heading ‘Ethics and Standards in Politics’. It seems unbelievable that almost twice as many members wanted to discuss Ethics and Standards in Politics as wanted to discuss the housing crisis. Seemingly, even fewer members wanted to discuss climate change, the topic heading that achieved 8th position. Other really key issues like Workers Rights, Asylum and Immigration and Education were well down the ratings.
As Fraser McGuire, speaking at our well attended conference fringe meeting (pictured), put it, ‘Housing and Climate Change, how are these not priorities?’ In other words, why would the conference delegates not want to discuss resolutions addressing issues that are very much priorities as far as the general public are concerned? We can, of course, speculate on the reason for that, and speculation is fed by the number of rumours about MPs and party officers contacting delegates and asking them to withdraw their housing motion, or not to vote for housing in the ballot, as the shadow front bench team would be making announcements on housing from the platform.
Speculation was also fed by the bizarre arrangement for the priorities ballot. The ballot paper included only a list of seemingly random numbers, no topic headings were mentioned. In the ballot area delegates were provided with a separate list of approximately 50 topic headings to cross reference against the numbers on the ballot paper. It’s perhaps unsurprising that most delegates, eager to get back to the conference hall, took the easy option and chose numbers 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 and 12, which, spookily, just happened to be the numbers on the 6 topics that were recommended by an organisation called Labour to Win. Apparently, these were recommended on the basis that it was important to demonstrate party unity via the ballot process and, therefore, not vote for anything that contradicted the National Policy Forum reports.
We were pleased to see that the housing crisis did achieve a higher profile at conference compared to recent conferences, with a greater number of statements from the shadow front bench. However, these did not provide the level of commitment needed to resolve the worst aspects of the housing crisis. The discussion that would have taken place had housing been prioritised, would undoubtedly have called for those commitments from the next Labour government, and may even have resulted in a conference decision to embed those commitments in our policy.
It should not be the role of party officials, MPs or a contorted ballot process to prevent those discussions taking place. So, perhaps there is a need for a discussion of Ethics and Standards in Politics after all, and we look forward to having that discussion before the next conference takes place. In the meantime, we thank everyone who came along to our fringe meeting and made sure that a decent debate of the key issues did take place in Liverpool and that the campaign for the policies we need continues.
Carol Hayton
Labour Campaign for Council Housing 