Marcus Roberts investigates how a primary for Labour’s London mayoral nomination might work
Ed Miliband’s decision to select Labour’s London mayoral candidate by primary was the right call, but that does not make it an easy matter. Candidate selection by any system is a process fraught with organisational complexity as questions of timing, choice of system, voter eligibility, voting methods and participation for both the public and members alike abound.
The first question is when to hold the primary. Running a primary of any type will be a huge endeavour for the party and will require significant funding and staffing to get it right. London has crucial council elections in all 32 boroughs in 2014 and is home to 12 target seats for 2015. These must be our priority. The London regional party will need all the resources at their disposal for these vital campaigns. In the light of this, the primary should not be held until after the general election.
Some argue that we need our candidate in place before this to give them a longer run at the mayoral election itself. However, the momentum the primary process will generate for the eventual candidate should more than compensate for the shorter campaign. In order to give the party time to properly plan the process after the general election, the shortlisting process should begin in the summer of 2015 with polling day in late October or November. The challenge of organising this is so great, and the need to get it right so obvious, that we must give party staff the time they need to prepare. This timetable would still leave roughly three months for the primary and six months for the mayoral campaign itself – this is in line with most US elections.
The next question is which type of primary to use. Some primaries, most recently the Australian Labor party’s selection for its Sydney mayoral candidate, use an electoral college system. In Sydney this consisted of a 50-50 split between Labor party members in one college and the wider public in the other. This ensures a strong role for party members in the process, but it also has significant risks. A candidate can win one college while losing the other. Instead, Labour should have a single electoral college consisting of every Londoner eligible to vote in the mayoral election in 2016 who broadly shares the values of the British left.
If one of the aims is to include as many people as possible in the primary process then we need to ensure every Londoner who will be eligible to vote in the mayoral election itself is able to take part. The French Socialist party’s primary to select its presidential candidate offers us a successful model of how to do this while ensuring those taking part are genuinely supportive of the party. In France, anyone eligible to vote in the presidential election was able to vote in the primary, including those who were below the age of majority but who would be old enough by election day itself. We could easily do the same in London using the electoral register as our voter universe. It would be a great way for Labour to engage younger Londoners and show that our commitment to votes at 16 is more than just words.
In terms of ensuring voters are genuinely Labour party supporters, again the French Socialist model points the way with its minimum €1 fee and declaration of allegiance to the values of the French left which read, ‘I pledge myself to the values of the left and the Republic, to the creation of a society of freedom, equality, fraternity, secularism, justice and solidarity of progress.’ Together, these measures would help cover the cost of the primary and ensure that there is a sufficient barrier to those wanting to participate mischievously. In France, the fee both covered the cost of the primary and raised an additional €1.5m that largely went into François Hollande’s war-chest for the general election.
Former Labour party general secretary Ray Collins’ consultation document on the London primary raised the question of online voting. How people are able to vote will be very important to whether the process is a success. The Totnes and Gosport primaries run by the Conservatives before the 2010 election were both done by postal voting. While this resulted in high turnouts – 25 per cent and 19 per cent respectively – it was also prohibitively expensive, costing £38,000 per constituency or 55 pence per elector. In France, polling stations were run by party volunteers and turnout was a respectable 6.5 per cent. It was also much more affordable, costing the equivalent of just seven pence per elector.
And there are serious concerns about using online voting. While it was a success in our European candidate selection, it is completely untested outside of the party membership and I am unaware of any primary system from around the world that has used online voting. If we are to use online voting, we need to ensure that participants register first and that the deadline for applying for an online vote is several weeks before polling day so that we have time to run screenings in order to avoid multiple voting. As a natural benefit of membership all existing party members should certainly be afforded online voting. All other voting should be at polling stations across London, staffed by party volunteers. There is also a strong argument for the party supplying members with a postal vote as a way of strengthening the role of members without compromising the process.
In seeking to maximise public participation, we must also consider the role of the media. If the primary is to succeed in genuinely engaging Londoners then Labour personnel will have to work hard to secure at least one televised debate and a series of hustings in partnership with all the major London media outlets like the Evening Standard, Metro, City AM, LBC, BBC London and ITV London. They need to be given a stake in the primary to ensure they give it the coverage it deserves.
What is more, the primary process provides an important opportunity to better engage with Labour affiliates at the individual level – just as Miliband has proposed in terms of party and trade union reform more generally. Affiliate leader and activists alike should be closely consulted on how to maximise their members’ participation, perhaps with regard to online or postal voting rights.
Indeed, the biggest criticism of a primary is that it weakens the position of members and as a result makes it less likely that people will join or renew. I do not completely buy this. If choosing candidates was why people joined the Labour party then turnout in selections would be far higher than it is. The vast majority of members join the party because of their commitment to Labour’s cause, not for a transactional benefit. Having said that, members must have as big a say in the primary process as possible and this can be achieved by having a shortlisting process consisting of constituency Labour party nominations. Each CLP could host a hustings and vote to endorse a small number of candidates to take through to the shortlist. Members could also have the benefit of receiving a postal vote and not having to register in advance to participate.
All this is by no means the only way of tackling the challenges of a London primary but it should demonstrate both the complexity of the task and the need for a workable solution. All told, it is a great opportunity for Labour to broaden its appeal and, provided we get the questions of timing, system and engagement right, it could do so while demonstrating through actions, not words, our commitment to change.
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Marcus Roberts is deputy general secretary of the Fabian Society
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One solution to the problem of how to pick the Mayoral candidate is to scrap the post. It is true that in the days of Reg Goodwin and Sir Desmond Plummer – though not Sir Horace Cutler or Ken Livingstone – the leader of the Greater London Council was not a personality cult person but simply primus inter pares of the leading Labour councillors on the GLC. Indeed, an element of drabness, as if Vi Attlee was running the show, and that is partly because London needs a seasoned local government veteran rather than a bow-tied circus performer (I’m referring here to Horace Cutler rather than any successor).. The virtue of having a decently-sized Greater London Council which picks its leader though the party group system, is that group can (and did, in 1981) chose who is to lead it between elections if the incumbent leader is perceived as not up to the challenges.
What caused such a furore in 1981 was the displacement of the leader immediately after elections in which he was the putative future leader of the GLC. But local councils up and down the country can make do with annual elections of group leader, and it works. Weak performers are quietly eased out and better successors installed, often with few tears before bedtime.
The personality cult outcome of direct elections of mayors reaches its ultimate absurdity when ‘Angus the Monkey got elected in Hartlepool and Boris Johnson in London, a man so incapable of answering a direct question that you think ‘balderdash and piffle’ was a coinage created to describe his waffling, and dreadful at appointing deputy mayors. These weaknesses were not found apparent when he faced several million direct electors even after a four-year term of office, with plenty of TV coverage, in which he increased bus fares by 50%.
Yes, it could all be done in the months following the 2015 general election. And at least the primary candidates would know the financial context (i.e. whether the austerity would continue under the Tory coalition or be eased marginally under Labour). But the downside of a primary is that it pits one Labour supporter against another, and the financial backing begins to come into play. When I consider how much the process of picking our European elections slate cost, with the biggest fight being for 3rd place on the slate, it is absurd. Can we really afford a primary?