Unite and Divide

 As we said – It was never gonna happen…  

We proudly present this contribution from a much respected local political insider who a) has never given us a bum steer and b) has an opinion we value.

Never have we ever wanted to get up off our sunbed and raise a glass to this coruscating analysis of local politics:

So, Tony Norbury won’t be allowed to lose his seat to a teenage Green Party member next May, he has been told by Wirral Labour that he is not a fit and proper person to represent Labour,  as an elected local representative. 

Kathy and Alan Runswick,  Dave Brennan and Paul Davies ( who now control Wirral Labour) are Unite, they are not Labour let alone Corbynites, they just used Corbyn for their own political advantage. They have got their man in Birkenhead now, Mick , and the next part of the plan is to replace Angela Eagle in  Wallasey with Margaret  Greenwood as Wirral West is going to be hard to defend. This was ALWAYS about  Unite taking control and “Tight Pants” was a well meaning if useful fool for them.  He agitated against Phil Davies and Frank Field and allowed Mick “man of the people” Whitley to stroll in and take Birkenhead. 

The word is Whitless  intends to get Norbury, John Maher, Cllr  Bird and everybody else associated with him out the party as they have served their purpose.  Mick is backing defeated ex cllr Angie Davies for  Prenton next year and is making friendly noises to the old controlling right wingers as he needs them to campaign for him, why else did the Runswick’s et al allow Claughton Cllr George Davies onto the panel and not Comrade Norbury, weird aye!

Anyway there is no route back for him as in truth  Labour are going to lose at least two seats next May and maybe as many as four and they are very unlikely to win  Rock Ferry       or  Pensby. Labour are finished on Wirral for local elections, the council is likely to adopt a “committee system” to replace the current “Strong Leader Model” they currently have which will make it impossible for Labour to control Wirral as they have for the last decade. That’s fine by Unite as they only ever cared about the parliamentary seats, condemning the residents of Wirral to a failing a council is just “collateral damage” as far as they are concerned. 

The sad part is the same union controlling tactics that allowed Frank Field to become MP back in 79 are what has been used 40 years later!!  If you create slate voting monkeys who obediently follow somebody’s list then this is what happens, it’s also how you end up with Jared O’Mara and Fiona Onasanya as (disgraced) Labour MPs. 

Labour is so broken now that Britain faces a decade of right wing governance but rest assured that Mick, Margaret and Dan (Carden) will be shouting very loudly about how terrible things are for “their communities”, though luckily for them it won’t be personally that bad as £80,000 a year will at least lessen the burden of austerity to their families.  How is it that each of these Unite stooges, NONE OF WHOM LIVE IN THEIR RESPECTIVE CONSTITUENCIES, were able to be presented as the “local choice”?  

Anyway I don’t expect We will hear or see much of  Cllr Tony “tight pants” Norbury again so we should wish him good luck with his future and hope he enjoys his remaining time as a socialist representative

Into the Void

The contest to be the next Labour Group leader on Wirral Council and fill the blank void of nothingness soon to be left by current Wirral Council ‘leader’  Cllr Phil ‘Power Boy Pip’ Davies is proving to be such a fast moving story that our tip off that Cllr Paul Stuart was in line for the top job has already passed its sell by date. Sources tell us :

Don’t know where you got the Cllr Stuart for Leader story but that’s already old news.  Cllr Stuart does not want the post, so has withdrawn.

The new name in the frame to “help the Party heal”, and “lay out Labours vision for Wirral” ( or put another way the person willing to take £50k + in return for allowing the sorry collection currently running things to keep their allowances) is dog shit supremo Cllr Anita Leech.  Despite only having been in cabinet for five minutes Leech is the best that the current cabal can come up with. On the bright side there are still two weeks to go before the meeting to decide the next leader, so who knows maybe by then they might even select Tony ( pick me) Norbury, now that would be a sign of complete desperation!!!

And not to be left out (geddit) the “left” have decide to rally round Cllr Pat ( why talk for five minutes when you drone on for an hour) Hackett as their chosen “seat warmer” as interim Leader , in anticipation of the return of Yvonne ( voice of the people) Nolan.   They need somebody malleable, controllable and compliant until their contingent has the necessary numbers, after another round of deselections into the 2020 elections, to inflict their particular brand of middle class ‘socialism’ ( sorry I mean create the workers paradise that Wirral residents have been dreaming of) on our borough.  Pat is totally in the thrall of Paul Davies, and his muse Kathy Miller, who run, I mean organise for the benefit of the huddled masses, New Brighton Labour Party and was so grateful to escape the blood letting that saw 3 Labour Cllrs deselected that he has proven he has what it takes to be the the puppet they need…

As ever we’ll be reporting on developments as they happen and the way things are going almost anything will and can happen!…

Songs of The Labour Movement : Two Tribes

 

Our interest in the rising tide of Corbynism is, of course, how it impacts on local politics.  And you can say what you like about Jezzamania but it has at least shaken up (or a least slightly stirred) the moribund and complacent cabal at the heart of Birkenhead Constituency Labour Party (CLP).  Frank Field, having decried the Labour leader at every opportunity prior to this year’s general election, has been awfully quiet on the Corbyn front lately hasn’t he?

However where the impact has been most felt has been in the Wallasey CLP.  Ever since Wallasey MP Angela Eagle’s doomed Labour leadership challenge there have been deep divisions within the local CLP…..and it would seem from a leaked email from Cllr Adrian Jones sent to ‘Momentum Comrades’ – which somehow made its way to us – there clearly still are!

We’ll spare you the full text of the email as it’s more Citizen Smith than Councillor Jones. Suffice to say it’s as long-winded and self righteous as his council speeches and sets out his long-standing Corbyn – supporting credentials.

The genesis of all this rift was a bitter CLP meeting on 24^th June 2016, when Cllr Bernie Mooney (now Joint Deputy Leader of Wirral Council Labour Group ) was voted out of her position as secretary of Wallasey CLP and replaced by lefty Kathy Miller.  Paul Davies was voted in as co-vice Chair ( Cllr Paul Stuart was the other co-Vice Chair.)

The CLP voted to back Corbyn in his leadership bid.  Eagle got wind of this and was presumably an ‘Angry Bird’!  She hadn’t yet said she was going to run for leader… and didn’t until early July.

Meanwhile the CLP was suspended by the Labour NEC at their London HQ and remains suspended to this day.  Indeed the CLP only realised they’d been suspended when they read it in the Liverpool Echo!

This suspension was done on the ‘strength’ of bogus allegations that were lodged with the press (not the police, where they should have gone – but that presumably would have risked counter charges of wasting police time) saying that some members at the above meeting had engaged in bullying of others, intimidation and ‘homophobic acts’ against Eagle, who was not even present.

Reputedly, it was Cllr Stuart who was the ringleader of 17 people alleging bullying, intimidation and homophobia.  Angela Eagle christened them “whistleblowers”, sullying the name of genuine, good faith whistleblowers everywhere, and whatdyaknow?  the likes of the Liverpool Echo and The Guardian were there, ever eager to fuel the fire.

Throughout all this nothing was heard from Cllr Adrian Jones, the huge “Corbyn fan”, as his hero was pilloried in order to push Eagle’s leadership chances.  And whaddyaknow?  Both Jones’s Mr and Mrs and Cllr Stuart can be seen in the photos attached to this tweet, supporting Eagle.  This was in the run-up to the 2017 election, 9 months after the CLP suspension and #Brickgate.

Ultimately the allegations went nowhere, but the damage inflicted by the media coverage had been done. We understand one CLP member still has a charge hanging over them, whilst those making bogus allegations have been strangely passed over for any disciplinary action.  Is it any wonder the rifts persist and that there are plenty of angry left wingers in Wallasey CLP who feel betrayed?  After being expected to tramp the streets in support of Angela Eagle during the general election campaign , some are suspecting that deals will now be done behind their backs rather than the embedded enemy within faced head on and challenged.

 

Meanwhile, Cllr Paul Stuart who’d nailed his colours to the Eagle mast has,  since Corbyn’s unexpectedly strong performance in the general election,  had a bit of a rethink and now wants the world to know, via the leaked Jones email , that he is supporting Jezza. But the idea that Cllr Stuart would now also be backing Corbyn is outrageous when you can find him on the internet posing for photos outside the smashed window of #Brickgate.  Along with Cllr Stuart , Eagle diehards Cllr Mooney, and Merseyside Police & Crime Commissioner Jane Kennedy were immediately on hand to be interviewed on TV and press suggesting that Corbyn supporters were behind the brick through the shared stairwell window ….which apparently wasn’t Eagle’s constituency office window anyway! You can get a flavour of the furore here 

Moreover, Merseyside plod calmly intoned six months later that the constituency office window was never reported to them as being damaged !  But you wouldn’t know this if you picked up any national or local newspaper because they wouldn’t touch it !  And by that time, the whole sorry circus of MSM dissemblers had left Eagle’s “busy summer of lies” unretracted, and moved onto the next emerging #FakeNews bombshell needing their undivided attention….

https://wirralinittogether.blog/2016/08/05/angela-eagle-supporters-have-been-discovered-telling-lies-about-wallasey-clp-vice-chair-paul-davies/

Meanwhile only time will tell whether Cllr Stuart proves to be as an effective shape-shifting politico as Cllr Jones,

 

To quote from the latter’s email…

Comrades, “Now is the time” to stop acting like a “Party within a party” – and even like a “Momentum within Momentum”.

It is time to grasp that the mainstream (often called the “Left”) has won back the heart and soul of the Labour Party.  I do not know of a single member of the Seacombe Branch who has not fully supported my own declarations for Corbyn on the two websites or who does not support him now.  So why introduce friction where there need be none? Let’s try now to be a single Labour Party in Seacombe Ward.

Some comrades will remember that we also, for a while, held “Songs of the Labour Movement” musical evenings in the Park View Social Club – an opportunity for comrades to perform – or just listen and rub shoulders informally.  But, since then, we have had the difficulty of the Party being suspended so long that many of us don’t even know each other.

Under the circumstances can we suggest that any future CLP sing-a-long  starts off with a rousing rendition of  “Two Tribes” ?