Who do Compass think they are?

I try to avoid looking too obsessed by Compass, honestly I do.

But today Compass has been singularly unhelpful to the Labour Party, which it purports to support, by reopening the question of the Party Leadership, as reported in today's Guardian.

Their timing could not be more destructive – on the day of the final Queen’s Speech before a General Election, and just as the first tentative steps towards a Labour recovery have started with a thumping by-election win in Glasgow North East and a 4% boost in this week’s ICM poll.

Who do the Compass “Management Committee” think they are to sit around plotting to undermine a Labour Prime Minister? And more to the point what do the Guardian think Compass is, publicising the self-aggrandising sectarian scheming of a small group as though it was major news?

The Guardian consistently calls Compass a think-tank. This is insulting to real think-tanks that work objectively to generate new policy ideas. Compass is a political faction, the only policies it publishes stem from its own prejudices, not objective research.

The Compass claim to have 4,000 members and 30,000 supporters is repeated without scrutiny, yet the membership list includes people who swear they have resigned from it or never joined, and generated a paltry 237 voters when Compass held internal elections; and the 30,000 “supporters” is a mass-spamming exercise sending emails to anyone unlucky enough to have their address fall into Compass’ hands. I get two emails to different addresses from Compass yet I’ve never indicated support for them.

At their AGM last weekend Compass "General Secretary" Gavin Hayes (winner, most pompous title of the year award 2009) compared himself to the General Secretary of the Labour Party, saying:

"And on the Labour Party I have to say I think my counterpart Ray Collins could learn a thing or two from Compass, and let me tell you if you’d wanted a robot for a General Secretary then you might have picked him. It gives me no pleasure to say that over this last year, as a long-serving loyal Labour activist myself, I’ve stood back and watched in utter aghast at some of the goings on in Labour’s Ivory Towers. Whilst this week may mark 20 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall, increasingly the New Labour machine looks a bit like a clapped out Trabant, feels a bit like the dog days of an Eastern European Communist Party – an ossified party state welded to a dogmatic ideology, entrenched elites, dormant party organisations and a stagnant economy."

Not only is it hubris on a massive scale for the head bureaucrat of a staff of four to compare himself to the General Secretary of the Party in government; it's unfair to personally attack a paid member of party staff who is prohibited by their contract from responding to these kind of attacks, and massively insulting to the hard-pressed and hard-working staff who are working their socks off to try to win the General Election.

This confused grouplet, who advocate a lurch to the left for Labour but are reported to favour Blairite candidates Alan Johnson and David Miliband for Party Leader; and who claim to back Labour but give platforms to the Green Party’s candidate in a seat they hope to take of us, gets far more publicity than it deserves.

Labour Party members should concentrate on trying to prevent a Tory General Election victory and reject the sort of sectarian plotting and undermining of Party unity that Compass is indulging in.

Obligatory dig at Compass

From the Compass website:

"Local Convenors (UK wide)
As part of the ongoing development of Compass, this autumn we’ll be encouraging the formation of local groups across the UK. This is a crucial step for Compass to continue to build its membership, to increase its influence and not just be seen as a London operation.
It’s envisaged these will meet on a monthly basis to primarily discuss Compass ideas – in particular hold discussions themed around Compass publications. At present there is a lack of quality progressive debate at the local level – the purpose of these groups will be to revitalise political debate at the local level around the key issues/challenges facing the democratic left.
In addition we want groups to be action focused around particular policy campaigns Compass is advocating at the national level. Another important role is linking to other groups – such as trade union branches, community action groups and local groups of members from other pressure groups. We want groups to become positive change-makers in their local area."

Now call me old-fashioned but if I considered myself on the left, and had gone to the bother of joining a group aiming to influence Labour's future direction I would

a) stand to be secretary or campaigns officer of my local Labour Party (or to be a local councillor) not "Compass Local Convenor"
b) try to get "quality progressive debate at the local level" going at my local Labour branch or CLP, where there might be people that disagreed with me (isn't that what "debate" is about) rather than setting up separate little grouplets to have a Compass love-in
c) be so busy campaigning on both issues and elections with my local Labour comrades in one happy, comradely team that I wouldn't have time for separate campaigns under the "Compass" banner that by definition bring no political benefit to the Labour Party
d) link to trade unions and socialist societies through the structures of the Labour Party they set up, rather than inviting them to provide a token proletarian presence at the Compass monthly whine/wine and cheese.
e) believe that the body best suited to being "positive change-makers in their local area" was the Labour Party

What are these clowns on?

Compass is starting to take on all the characteristics of a political party - an HQ, staff including a "General Secretary", an annual conference, local organisers, local branches, its own campaigns, its own regular meetings, its own relationships with unions and other groups outside Labour's structures - albeit a rather absurd political party with no organic roots in the working class, a leadership personality cult and policies last taken seriously at NUS conferences in the late '70s.

At least if they spend their time in exclusive conclaves it gives them less chance to screw up their local Labour Parties.

Dissent in Compass

Readers will know that although some of my best friends are members of Compass it is not my favourite political organisation.

A brief scan through the comments on its website reveals it is not even the favourite organisation of some of its own members, who feel Neal Lawson has taken it a long way from the "critical friend of Blair and promoter of whizzy new policy ideas" role suggested when it was founded.

Presumably those unhappy with having their names associated with the increasingly leftwards slide of Compass include Ruth Turner, now gainfully employed at No10 but then on the NEC, who was a signatory of its founding statement.

Leading the fightback inside Compass at its AGM last weekend was one Stan Rosenthal who ran for Compass' Management Committee on this platform:

"Over the past year I have been trying to open a debate within Compass on the democratic legitimacy of the leadership committing us to a strongly anti-Blair stance in the absence of this being part of the original Compass recruiting pamphlet or being included in the platforms on which MC members were elected. I also considered that such an excessively confrontational and divisive attitude towards Blair was counterproductive to our progressive ideas being taken up by this Labour government and by any future electable Labour Party.

The response of the MC was first, to stop the posting of these views on the old Compass website, then (after persistent challenging) to post, but bury, them in the deep recesses of that site and finally to censor any reference to the Compass democratic deficit on the more current sites.

Voting for me would send a signal that your views on where Compass should stand on political-positioning issues can no longer be taken for granted. If elected, I will continue my efforts to provide the opportunity for all members to have a say on such matters. Dare more Democracy…….within Compass! Be the change you wish to see… in Compass! Vote Rosenthal!"

Good to see such tolerance of dissent and such democratic accountability from Neal et al.

I am almost tempted to join so that I can vote for Mr Rosenthal but the prospect of contributing £32.50 to Gavin Hayes' salary is a price too high...

Compass commits political suicide

Regular readers will know I've always been scornful of soft left faction Compass.

My distaste increased when they advocated tactical voting for the Lib Dems in the 2010 General Election.

Rather than the Lib Dems' subsequent coalition (merger?) with the Tories and promotion of Thatcherite economics and cuts having been a lesson for Compass, it has ploughed on in similar vein.

Today it announced a 68% vote in a membership ballot for allowing members of other political parties to join it. Presumably the Greens, SWPers, Lib Dems or self-defined progressive Tories that might join will get a say in the stance Compass takes in internal Labour debates. Compass is thus going to be acting as a Trojan Horse into the Labour Party for our political opponents at exactly the moment that the behaviour of the Lib Dems in the Coalition is proving that all progressives should be Labour members, and that the idea that there is a plurality of parties on the centre-left is at least temporarily redundant.

I hope the 32% of opponents in Compass of this "opening up" to other parties will walk out and find a new political home.

There ought to be a voice and a home in the Party for soft left activists who are also partisan Labour loyalists. Compass can no longer provide than home.

This may prove to be as decisive a moment in the history of Labour's internal political currents as the "realignment of the left", when Compass' predecessor the LCC (Labour Coordinating Committee) quit the Bennite Rank and File Mobilising Committee in the mid-'80s to become a tactical ally of the right of the Party in support of Kinnock.

Mass membership of Compass swarms to polls

Compass, the vibrant , pulsating soft-left faction named after a catering out-sourcer (and if you believe the Guardian, setter of the future agenda for British politics), has announced the thrilling results of its internal elections: http://www.compassonline.org.uk/news/item.asp?n=5207

Compass is very keen on lecturing the rest of the Labour Party about internal democracy and membership participation.

I was therefore delighted to note that out of several thousand ballot papers dispatched, a number inflated by sending them to non-members and indeed Compass' opponents, precisely 237 people could be bothered to vote. Presumably this represents Compass' entire active membership: about 0.4 people per CLP. No wonder most people never report seeing one of these rare creatures operating at grassroots level in their local Labour Party.

This enabled people to get onto the Compass Management Committee with as few as eight first preference votes. Chuka Umunna, the man hailed as Britain's answer to Barack Obama by the New Statesman (http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2009/01/chuka-umunna-labour-obama) got er... 16 votes. Guardian mega-pundit Neal Lawson topped the poll with 90 votes, equalling the number of readers of his new book campaigning against that great social evil, shopping.

Nice to see all the ex-NUS opponents of Labour transferring to each other just like they did when they were fighting against Labour in student politics.

The election to Compass' Youth Committee was even more of a non-event, with candidates requiring 4.77 votes after transfers to get elected. Noel Hatch topped the poll with 10 votes. Ben Soffa (a name I could swear I had heard connected to another rather more leftwing organisation) got elected with 4.04 votes after transfers. Unless I have misunderstood the rather confusing results sheet, some candidates were so overcome by the experience of participating in this exercise in participatory democracy that they failed to vote for themselves and got zero first preference votes.

Keep up the struggle, comrades, the forces of capitalism tremble in the face of your advancing hordes...

Thanks for the offer, but no thanks...

As a newly elected Labour NEC member I ought to be delighted when other people start calling for the NEC to have more power.

But I will be saying a polite "no thanks" to a suggestion which the Communist Party of Great Britain is supporting and says comes from soft-left faction Compass, that Labour's NEC should elect the Shadow Cabinet: http://www.cpgb.org.uk/article.php?article_id=1004131

They quote Compass as saying: "A more democratic way for the Labour Party to decide who should be in the shadow cabinet, and thus with more of a chance of being in the cabinet once the party gains government, would be for the party’s nominally highest elected body to be given the task".

The CPGB says: "This demand for the party’s national executive committee to be given the job of appointing the shadow cabinet is eminently supportable by Marxists."

Three reactions:

• What business is it of the CPGB how another party's internal democracy functions?
• They seem pretty categorical in quoting Compass as saying "a more democratic way for the Labour Party to decide who should be in the shadow cabinet, and thus with more of a chance of being in the cabinet once the party gains government, would be for the party’s nominally highest elected body to be given the task", even linking to the document they quoted from (http://clients.squareeye.com/uploads/compass/documents/Compass%20Transforming%20Labour%20WEB2.pdf) but when you look at the actual document that sentence isn't there. Has someone at Compass retrospectively edited it out because it's too daft even for them? Or did the CPGB imagine this Compass demand.
• There's a good reason for the PLP electing the Shadow Cabinet. They know them and work with them. As an NEC member I don't have that kind of knowledge of the candidates so I don't feel qualified to make that choice.

Nice idea though. Wonder if they had me in mind when they wrote it.

A little reminder about tactical voting

Compass are consulting their members about whether to advocate tactical voting: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/apr/23/compass-tactical-voting-ballot

Mehdi Hassan at the New Statesman has correctly guessed I wouldn't be impressed: http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/mehdi-hasan/2010/04/tactical-voting-compass-labour

Compass' contemplation of advocating tactical voting is silly on two counts:

a) the Lib Dems have at no point indicated any preference for falling in with Labour in the event of a hung parliament, in fact logic suggests they would have nothing to gain by propping us up if we had just been ejected by the electorate. Therefore helping increase the number of Lib Dem MPs by tactical voting might just be increasing the size of majority of a Con/LD partnership.

b) the only thing that the LDs have said would influence their behaviour in a hung parliament is the "mandate" acquired by the other two parties. Assuming that as PR supporters they mean they will help the party that got most votes to form a government, it is important to ensure that Labour maximises the number of votes we get nationwide, including in seats where we are in third place, as any tactical votes "loaned" to the LDs will not be gratefully acknowledged as such, they'll be used as ammo for suggesting that Labour has less of a "mandate" than the Tories and that therefore the LDs should help Cameron form a government.

Advocating tactical voting is an appalling betrayal of local Labour Parties and PPCs battling away in third-placed seats and a sure-fire way to undermine our activist and local government base in those areas so that we cease to be a national party. It is also often based on dud information - results from 2005 that are five years out of date and in any case notional because of boundary changes are used to try to guess who the main challenger to the Tories is in a given seat. If this criteria had been followed in 1997 tactical voting advocates would have called for a Lib Dem vote in seats like Hastings & Rye which in fact Labour gained from third place.

By the time they have completed their ballot Compass many well find the scenario they are trying to respond to out of date. For instance, if tonight's MORI poll (Con 36% (+4), Lab 30% (+2), LD 23% (-9)) turns out to be the start of a trend rather than a rogue poll, we are back to the tight two-party Lab vs Con fight we saw until the first debate.

Just a gentle reminder to any Labour Party members who are in Compass that if they as individuals publicly advocate tactical voting for other parties they can risk being automatically expelled from the Labour Party under Chapter 2, Rule A 4 B of the Labour Party Rule Book:

"A member of the party who ... supports any candidate who stands against an official Labour candidate ... shall automatically be ineligible to be or remain a party member, subject to the provisions of part Chapter 6 A.2 below of the disciplinary rules."

Where we can identify potential Lib Dem voters as seeing themselves on the centre-left (not all do) we need to be getting them to understand that Clegg has given no assurances that he won't help give the keys to Downing Street to the Tories and that the only unambiguous way to block Tory participation in government is to elect the maximum number of Labour MPs.

Compass prepares to commit political suicide

The soft-left faction Compass has suggested many crazy ideas over the years, but has now topped it all by suggesting opening its ranks up to Lib Dems, just at the point when the Lib Dems are self-destructing as a party (down to 9-10% in the polls) and have clearly demonstrated through their actions in government that they are not a centre-left or progressive party.

There's detail here: http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/98181

and here: http://www.labourlist.org/mark-ferguson-can-compass-survive-outside-the-labour-party

Part of me wants to gloat at the tactical and strategic stupidity of this move, which will destroy Compass' credibility within the Labour Party.

But on another level it is desperately sad. There are a lot of people who legitimately self-describe as soft-left and sit between the Bennite hard left and people like me. They deserve a better vehicle for their politics, a better forum for discussion and a better space to network in the Party than Compass. There must be many of them who are absolutely solid Labour partisans and want nothing to do with openings to the Lib Dems, Greens or Trots. I hope they get out of Compass and create something better that will play a more constructive role in the internal life of the Labour Party (for a start off it shouldn't be allied with the hard left Grassroots Alliance in internal party elections) and have no truck with appeasement of other parties. If they get this right it could be as significant as the Labour Co-ordinating Committee's 1985 realignment of the left (when the soft left split from the Bennites and went into alliance with the right of the Party).

The plot thickens

I'm grateful to Peter Kenyon for explaining a bit more about how the Grassroots Alliance slate of left candidates for Labour's NEC is picked.

Seems I was a bit premature in my post below about assuming Peter was part of it, particularly as the rather snippy exchange in the comments on his post suggest he is not getting on particularly well with everyone in the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy (CLPD).

So the new info in Peter's post is in summary:

• He hasn't been selected by Save The Labour Party (STLP) yet. There's a ballot between him and Garry Heather (Islington North CLP Chair). Which is strange as I thought Garry had already run and lost in the ballot at the Labour Representation Committee (LRC) AGM.
• Winning the ballot in STLP or LRC doesn't guarantee you get on the final Grassroots Alliance slate. Which begs the question how is this negotiated or agreed on and by whom?
• The CLPD doesn't hold a membership ballot for its nominees.
• Peter implies Compass Youth are part of the Grassroots Alliance but that Compass proper isn't.
• He also implies "Progressives for London" are involved, which is strange as this is a broad alliance of people opposed to Boris and keen on getting Ken Livingstone back in as Mayor, and goes beyond Labour ranks to include Greens and others. I almost joined Progressives for London. If I had would that make me eligible for the Grassroots Alliance slate?
• He alludes to a mysterious meeting between Neal Lawson of Compass and Ken Livingstone of Progressives for London, presumably about Ken running with Compass support, or Compass separately getting a place on the Grassroots Alliance slate ... or is there going to be a separate Compass slate that backs Ken and Ann Black but not the other Grassroots Alliance candidates.

More nonsense from Compass

My reaction to the Compass High Pay Commission proposal (http://www.compassonline.org.uk/campaigns/campaign.asp?n=5246) is that I could not care less what the super rich earn - it's seeing the least well-off in society properly rewarded for their labour and free of poverty that gets me politically fired-up.

It seems a very odd political priority to push the punishment of a very small number of the extremely financially successful rather than focus on the betterment of the least well off. In tax terms punishing the super rich few would not generate enough to be useful for practical redistribution, might indeed lower the tax take due to evasion and emigration and might stuff the economy even more than it already is by stifling entrepreneurialism. I.e. the only benefit would be to placate the feelings of the jealous or politically angry, not to make the poor richer.

Have Compass never read John Rawls' "Theory of Justice" (summary here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Theory_of_Justice), which makes the logically impeccable case that social and economic inequalities should be arranged so that "they are to be of the greatest benefit to the least-advantaged members of society" i.e. an unequal distribution of wealth or other resources can be just when it maximizes the benefit to those who have the lowest allocation of resources - the Maximin theory?

All this political energy should be going into anti-poverty pay initiatives like the London Living Wage campaign, not wasted on bashing a group of people who are so small in numbers as to be statistically irrelevant and already paying vast sums in tax.

Ordinary hard-working people want a better life for their families and not to be exploited. My guess is very few of them subscribe to limiting the wages of the people at the opposite end of the spectrum.

Can anyone name a free society where a maximum wage has successfully operated without leading to massive offshore tax evasion? Why wouldn't the people threatened just go and work and earn in the US or some other country without these kind of remuneration restrictions?

And who are Compass' targets? Just bankers, if so how many? FTSE 100 ceos get mentioned in the text but surely some of these in sectors outside finance don't deserve bracketing morally with Fred the Shred et al? What about TV and pop stars and footballers - my hunch is the public don't mind their heroes earning vast amounts if they have a unique talent? And what about entrepreneurs or inventors who create jobs and bring wealth into the country - does Compass think it would be a good thing to cap their earnings?

And why pick on capping pay, as opposed to all the other ways the very rich get income (e.g. return on investments)?

The whole idea is puerile and the worst kind of bandwagon jumping, but that's Compass for you.

The conceit of Neal Lawson

That's enough about Trident.

Now let's resume normal service with a look at Compass Chair Neal Lawson.

Neal has been Down Under. Unfortunately for the British Labour Party he had a return ticket.

His trip was not, mind, a fact-finding trip to find out how the ALP has got a huge poll lead, is being rejuvinated by new moderate leader Kevin Rudd or is in power and governing well in every state and territory government.

Nope, he went to tell them "the lessons they could learn from" Compass.

I think that is what is known as a Pommie colonialist mentality.

Did anyone tell the dominant faction in the ALP, the Labor Right, that he was there?

And what lessons did he tell the bemused Aussies? How to publish tract after tract of pseudo-intellectual codswallop? How to undermine your party's current and next leader? How to regularly attack your own party in the Guardian? How to be wrong on almost every major issue? How to preach democracy but rig your consultation poll on the Deputy Leadership?

Here's what he actually said, in italics:

• Don’t rely on or blame leaders: Neither Tony Blair, the new ALP leader Kevin Rudd, Gordon Brown or any other Labour leader has all the answers. Leaders always take the path of least resistance. They need to be channelled to take the best possible path. Crying betrayal just disempowers us. What a hypocrite. He spends all his time blaming leaders.
• Don’t turn desperation into capitulation: The left in the UK gave Blair too much room and too much credit after 1997. We didn’t win as New Labour and we didn’t have to govern as New Labour. We won, like all oppositions, as not being like the previous failed government. More radical paths were open to us and still are. This probably one of the most politically illiterate single paragraphs I have ever read. A good example of Neal writing the diametrical opposite of the truth and thinking if he asserts it enough times it will be retrospectively true. And back in 1997 he was one of the worst "New, New, New, liquidate the Party" ultras.
• Have an alternative economic policy: The left has been lazy on economic policy above all else. Its left just one route – too much accommodation with free market practices that lead to a social recession. The Compass report on A New Political Economy sets out the starting points of such an alternative. Yeah, an alternative economic policy - a real vote winner like it was in 1983. An alternative to the prosperity we actually have had for 10 years. We'll have to give that a try on the doorsteps: "let's pull you out of the misery of the social recession you didn't know you were in. You'll lose your job, but never mind, you'll get a yoghurt weaving class or esperanto lessons to make you feel more socially prosperous."
• Have an alternative public service reform agenda: Don’t just be left with commercialisation as the only response to new demands on public services. Develop democratic and collectivist alternatives such as co-production. "Co-production"????? Oh I see, another made up concept from the Compass book of ideas generated by 2nd year sociology students...
• Have an electoral strategy: New Labour has held a monopoly on this issue and must be challenged. Not least because 4 million votes have been lost since 1997 and more of the same strategy will see us lose the next election. Yep Neal's got an electoral strategy. It's called winning all the 400,000 Guardian readers but losing the other 99% of the population.
• Believe a different world is possible: Left politics must be about transformation not just adaptation. People join Labour party’s and align themselves to left politics because they want to change the world. If we stop believing this is possible then we start to go backwards. Believe a different world is possible. But one only Compass members would want to live in.
• Build a force of ideas and organisation: Ideas and beliefs are the starting point of politics but as Lenin said “the victory of ideas needs organising” and cannot be left to chance. Aha, a Lenin quote. Obviously a great inspiration for all democratic socialists (ignoring the few hundred thousand of us he had murdered in the Red Terror. I hope he quoted Lenin in Sydney. They expel people who quote Lenin there.

Welcome back Neal. I was missing your frequent reminders of exactly how pernicious and laughable Compass is.

Why?

Another day brings another bizarre email piece of muppetry from Compass.

Why are they running a "Labour Leadership Ballot"?

They are not an affiliate so have no nomination rights.

I presume that like all the other campaigning groups within the Party they have supporters of different leadership candidates in their ranks - in Compass' case quite likely all five. What does measuring the support do? Will they be issuing a line to their members demanding they back the winner of this internal ballot?

And why make a big deal of encouraging people to join Compass to take part in this ballot which has not a lot of impact or meaning? ("You have until 6pm today (Thursday 29 July) to become a member in order to take part in these important elections.")

If they wanted to maximise their influence in the party wouldn't they be better off emailing their list recommending people who aren't party members yet join the Labour Party so they can vote in the real leadership ballot not a mickey mouse one?

As Compass may be unfamiliar with the Labour Party website, here's the link: https://secure2.labour.org.uk/join/

I live in hope that someone on planet Compass actually understands that getting involved in the Labour Party and its "actually existing" structures is more important than getting involved in their own think-tank/faction/parallel party.

Quiz question

It's a matter of weeks until a knife-edge General Election. Everyone in the Labour Party is focussed on the imminent task of defeating a right-wing Tory opposition.

Imagine you are Gavin Hayes, self-styled "General Secretary" of soft left faction Compass. You control a remarkable political asset, an email mailing list that you claim has 40,000 people on it. What to do at this critical political juncture?

Do you:

a) have a chat with Labour Gen Sec Ray Collins about how you can help, then email the 40,000 people on your list urging them to join Labour if they are not members, to donate to Labour's campaign, and giving them contact details of marginal Labour seats so they can get out and campaign for a Labour victory?

or do you

b) act as though the General Election is someone else's problem, and instead email the 40,000 people on your list with a 29 question survey about internal reforms of Labour's structures, including such bright ideas as mandatory reselection of MPs (copyright Tony Benn, 1980), forcing Labour's leader to face annual re-election, smashing the union link by electing the leader in a primary, and refocusing Labour away from being a "political machine for elections" (elections, power, actually doing things for people, how dull!) and turning it into a cross between a debating society and a student union campaign committee? Oops sorry I forgot, another burning question asked by Compass is whether the Chair of Young Labour should be a "full-time sabbatical Support Officer". Voters talk of little else when I canvass them.

Guess which one Gav did: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/mar/10/compass-rebuilding-labour-questionnaire. That was a tough one to predict wasn't it.

Aside from being possibly the dumbest timed initiative ever, even by Compass standards, and a grotesque distraction from the task in hand, the document must have been written by someone with no personal interaction with Labour's local structures. It says "Labour could learn a lot from the way London Citizens allow their key activists in a local area to democratically decide the organisation's campaign priorities". Ahem. Labour's key activists in a local area do democratically decide the organisation's campaign priorities at things called branches, CLP general committees, and local government committees. Dear Compass, please try removing yourselves from the Westminster think-tank bubble and getting involved in your local Labour Party, campaigning for a Labour victory or running for local public office. You might learn a bit about why a "political machine for elections" is essential for the emancipation and betterment of the working class, about what ordinary voters actually think of the Guardianista policy pap you peddle, and about the reality of taking political decisions in the teeth of a recession.

Is Compass suffering from entryism?

Soft left faction Compass is holding its internal elections. Such is the organisation's administrative chaos that ballots have been emailed to non-members, including high-profile Labour moderates who have forwarded them to me.

Compass seems to have an entryist problem. At least four of the candidates in its committee elections are prominent former activists in the "Student Broad Left" faction in NUS. SBL runs candidates against official Labour candidates. It is the student front group for Socialist Action, the secretive Trot grouping that was Tariq Ali and John Ross' IMG (International Marxist Group) before deciding to enter into the Labour Party. Previously Socialist Action has had influence disproportionate to its size in CND, UAF, Socialist Campaign Group News and the inner circle of advisers around Ken Livingstone.

It is interesting they now see the increasingly leftwing Compass as fertile territory.

And tragic that Compass people like Neal Lawson and Sue Goss who fought Militant when they ran the old LCC now have a "no enemies to the left" tolerance of SA.

Compass vs Brown

Gordon Brown has very publicly backed the replacement of the Trident nuclear deterrent.

The policy is being steered by Defence Secretary Des Browne, one of his allies.

Compass today launched a "Rethink Trident" campaign attacking the Government's policy. The signatories to this show that they have enlisted as allies hard left MPs like Diane Abbott and Jeremy Corbyn, the SNP, Plaid Cymru, Respect's George Galloway, and Lib Dems like Ming Campbell and Shirley Williams (ironically someone who helped split the Labour Party because she opposed unilateralism ... hey there's consistency for you!).

Hopefully once he is PM Brown will remember the position taken by Compass on a policy he has given his personal backing to, and their penchant for alliances of convenience with Labour's most destructive internal oppoositionalists and our external enemies (including the SNP who are trying to exploit the Trident issue to beat Labour in the Scottish Parliamentary elections in May).

Neal Lawson and Compass have always tried to trade on alleged links to Brown. I always thought they were exaggerated and that Brown's own politics are on the right of the party. Now they are openly at war with him on one of the central policies that defines whether you are remotely serious about having an electable Labour Party or not. They don't just want to turn the clock back to before 1994, they want to unpick a policy settlement that was arrived at as long ago as 1988.

The Wrong Kind of Seats

My old comrade from the Labour Coordinating Committee Executive, Neal Lawson, reveals in today's Guardian that his disillusion with New Labour set in even earlier than I had realised:

"My first doubts crept in as early as election day in May 1997. I was crunching up long gravel drives in Enfield Southgate, where rumours abounded that no-hoper Stephen Twigg might oust Michael Portillo. After passing BMWs and Mercs I was met by enthusiastic upper-middle-class families who were "all for Tony Blair here". We were going to win, but what did we have to sacrifice to have these people in our tent?"

Of course, the kind of Guardianista chatterati demographic that backs Compass-style left politics are actually quite often "upper-middle-class" themselves. But they would never do anything as crass or nouveau riche as having crunchy "long gravel drives", driving BMWs or Mercs, or living in the kind of places like Enfield Southgate that only go Labour when we win elections.

No, no, no. "Good" upper-middle-class people whose votes Compass wants because Labour got them before 1997 have far too much taste for that. They live in town houses in Kentish Town, or Barnsbury, or Hampstead, or Highgate Village, or maybe if they are a bit younger and have only just sold their shares in LLM Communications, they might make do with somewhere a bit edgier in the inner city. They drive people carriers or Volvos and buy their foccacia at Fresh & Wild. Their drives are definitely not crunchy.

The funny thing is, the 1997 manifesto and campaign were never intended to appeal to Enfield Southgate. They weren't even targeted at Enfield North. They were very carefully calibrated to appeal to swing voters in the 70 key seats that Labour needed to form a majority - Edmonton, Mitcham & Morden, Hayes & Harlington, Brentford & Isleworth, those kind of places. Gritty places with lots of Sun readers concerned about tax, crime and defence - and not many crunchy long gravel drives. That that 1997 programme turned out to be wildly popular with all demographics, from the crunchy drive set to people in council flats, was accident, not fiendish Blairite design.

Where would Neal draw the line? He must be relieved we don't hold Putney, Wimbledon and Enfield Southgate now, but why stop there? Shall we get Compass to tell the voters in Dorset South, or Hastings & Rye, or Hove that Labour doesn't want their votes either? And as for Basildon, Harlow or Crawley ... I doubt they have branches of Fresh & Wild ... and I expect they do have a lot of people who aspire to own BMWs.

Can anyone imagine that a Tory - any Tory even the most Heathite Wet or most extreme rightwinger - writing the counterpoint to Lawson's words:

"But first a confession. I was a Thatcherite. Back in 1975, I believed she was serious about new politics, communities and Europe. More fool me. My first doubts crept in as early as election day in 1983. I was staggering up tower block staircases in Edmonton, where rumours abounded that no-hoper Ian Twinn might oust Ted Graham. After passing graffiti and piss on the staircase I was met by enthusiastic working class families who were "all for Maggie here", having done right-to-buy on their council flats. We were going to win, but what did we have to sacrifice to have these people in our tent?"

No they wouldn't. Because unlike Lawson and Compass the Tories at that time knew that if you don't seek to win the votes of every possible voter, sooner or later you are out of power and can do nothing for your core vote or anyone else. They forgot that lesson and are only just relearning it.

Lawson wants Labour to make the same mistake. But he won't get his way because Brown wants to win, not lose, the next election. Neal knows that, hence his squeals of betrayal before Brown has even got into No10. Game over, Neal.

Compass breaks cover

Labour's pamphlet-writing tendency, Compass, has broken cover today with a statement in the Guardian by the two Jons (Cruddas and Trickett) which appears to be some kind of very politely phrased, coded even, critique of Brown.

It's in full here, with a wider list of signatures from the usual suspects: http://www.compassonline.org.uk/article.asp?n=981

I am struggling to understand after carefully reading it what, beyond sounding a bit more left, they want Gordon to do.

There are lots of warm words:

They want "an intellectually and morally coherent vision for his premiership". Great. I expect Gordon being both intellectual and moral, already has one. But what voters want to see more than a vision is good schools and hospitals, low crime, security, a strong economy and preferably not to have to pay too much tax for it. If they suffer from inequality they probably want to be have a fairer share of the cake. Most of them couldn't give a toss about the "moral and intellectual" coherence of the package as long as it makes life better for their families.

They want "change" - but of an unspecified nature. They welcome the policy changes that Brown has already made but don't seem to trust his judgement to deliver more of the same direction, yet at the same time don't tell him what they do want him to do.

They don't want a "big tent" - hang about I thought Neal Lawson et al were amongst the loudest proponents of pluralism, and "let's not be beastly to the Lib Dems". Later in the same statement they contradict themselves and call for Brown to look "beyond the Labour Party".

They are against "dry economism". Being professional politicians or chatterati, the Compassites are handily insulated from real world concerns like inflation, unemployment and high interest rates that happen every time you lose focus on "dry economism".

But I can't find any actual policies except for an attack on the reactive change of position on inheritance tax. I.e. Compass confronted by a new Tory policy that is so hugely popular it is the primary policy contributor to turning a 10% Labour lead into a 7% Tory one pick reacting to this as the one specific thing to mention that they don't think Brown should have done!

They pander to the refrain of saloon bar morons up and down the country: voters are being "refused a meaningful choice". A) this is rubbish - there are hundreds of meaningful choices on policy between Labour and the Tories; B) we had a bigger choice between the parties in the '80s and early '90s - unfortunately presented with it the voters chose Thatcherism. I really do pity Labour Party members who can't see the difference between a Brown government and a Cameron one.

They claim Labour has failed to "energise the progressive middle class". I.e. it has based its policy agenda on the bread-and-butter aspirations of working people rather than the hot topics at the Islington dinner parties attended by some of the statement's signatories. Because of course the role of the party founded to represent the working classes should be to "energise the progressive middle class" - a class consisting of perhaps a million at best people out of a population of 60 million - who already had their own party, the Liberals, before we got our act together, but would rather like to control our one too.

They state: " Our essential question is this: what is the Labour government for? We are still unsure." They speak for their own confused selves. As far as I can tell most Ministers, MPs, Councillors, activists, members and voters - and the PM - know exactly what a Labour Government is for: delivering a more equal and just society with high quality public services and a strong economy. We've been doing it for ten years, and we should all get on with contributing to delivering it - and generating the policy ideas to take it forward. I don't see any way in which the latest Compass threnody makes any practical contribution to that. What a pointless organisation.

They never learn

You'd think Compass would have understood the damage they did to themselves and the Labour Party by advocating tactical voting.

But in what I assume is a deliberate attempt to wind-up and antagonise as many Labour activists as possible they have announced that Green MP Caroline Lucas "has just confirmed to address the Compass National Conference A New Hope".

The Greens may have interesting ideas we would want to engage with, but Ms Lucas just two weeks ago beat by a narrow margin a really very good Labour candidate, Nancy Platts, in the marginal seat of Brighton Pavilion. If we want to win a majority again we have to win that seat back.

Compass' track record on picking progressive allies to engage with ain't great. Remember that Clegg guy they said we should be finding common ground with?

Those of us who have fought the Greens at grassroots level know that they don't view us as potential allies but as a hostile force that needs to be beaten.

To take Compass' cheesy "A New Hope" Star Wars analogy further, if Labour are the Rebel Alliance they just invited a Sith Lord to speak at the briefing on how to attack the Death Star.

Compass' poll

Compass don't seem to be making very much of the poll they got YouGov to do of Labour Party members.

This is not surprising when you read the detailed results: http://www.yougov.co.uk/archives/pdf/Compass-FEB09_results.pdf

Party members don't want post office part-privatisation, and are keen on a windfall tax, but aside from that their views will have contradicted Compass' soft left world view:

They overwhelmingly think Gordon Brown is doing a good job.

More of them think Lord Mandelson is going a good job than they do Harriet Harman!

Only 11% say they are "very left wing" (Hard Left?) and a further 36% "fairly left wing" (Soft Left?), whilst 50% are either "slightly left-of-centre" or to the right of that.

Younger members, women, middle class members and southerners are very slightly to the left of their older, male, more working class and more northern comrades.

A majority want to see the DWP's welfare-to-work reforms implemented.

Compass: No enemies to the left?

Soft left faction Compass seems to have a remarkably lax approach to who can contribute to its website. This article is by Salma Yaqoob. You wouldn't know it as Compass don't explain who she is, but this is the same Salma Yaqoob who is a Respect Councillor, is de facto number 2 to George Galloway in Respect, came within 4,000 votes of becoming a Respect MP. Harry's Place has catalogued what her rather nasty political views are.

Is there anyone Compass wouldn't publish the views of? (me probably!)