Labour in NI & Leadership election?

[michaeloleary]

Tommy Broughan wants an all Ireland Labour Party and would be closer to SF than the SDLP
Eamon Gilmore is ex-Workers Party - is hardly enamoured with the SDLP
Ditto for Jan O'Sullivan from an ex DSP background

I understand the Labour members in NI have motion at this year's conference seeking support to contest the 2009 elections - will this feed into the leadership election? will there be a hustings in Belfast?

The SDLP might well have to find themselves a new partner (i.e FF) at the end of this year - an unusual piece of fallout from the Labour Leadership contest.

[beardyboy]

What happens if the Labour Party in London decide to field candidates if the forthcoming court case (is this still ongoing?) forces them to ?

[fionn_socialist-Edward]

Are you saying that Labour are seriously thinking about a 32 county party?
I would strongly support them on that then.
But would they have support with:SDLP,Sinn Fein,B Labour and all those other leftwing nationalists?

Where did you hear this?

[GÓM]

Unfortunately at the Hustings Hosted by Labour Youth on Saturday Eamon Gilmore voiced his opposition to Labour - Ireland contesting elections in the North.

Still. He will have a hard time fighting the motion at conference which as garnered a considerable about of support already from the membership and many of our few TDs.

[Keith-M]

Gilmore will be clever enough not to go near N.I. Having watched the shambles that Adams & co. made of the election in May, where it was proven that successfully fighting elections in two juristiciations is next to impossible, he will recognise that the new leader needs to concentrate on the problems the party organisation faces in this country.

[GÓM]

Gilmore will be clever enough not to go near N.I.

Its not his decision. Its the members. Its only the local we are talking about and its only about a dozen of seats at any case.

[GÓM]

[quote=shaneholden]

Gilmore will be clever enough not to go near N.I.

Its not his decision. Its the members. Its only the local we are talking about and its only about a dozen of seats at any case.

Am I not correct that your National Executive has the final word on organisati0onal issues, not the membership?[/quote:30jgpyvw]

that is incorrect but true in practice

[michaeloleary]

What happens if the Labour Party in London decide to field candidates if the forthcoming court case (is this still ongoing?) forces them to ?

I'd imagine it would be like the Green Party where there is an agreed cross community slate.

I undertsand you can be a member of both Labour Parties as they are sister parties.

As regards the SDLP I suppose it is a question of whether FF or Labour jumps first

[sandar]

laboiur need to do something radical to keep themselves in the news for a while...the sdlp are in a similar prredicamewnt..I have always wondered why the parties dont merge..the are afterall both labour parties.....the sdlp people could concentrate on the north, where they woukld ahve the benefit of being able to say that they are an all-ireland party with hopes(better than sinn fein) of being in government north and south of the border and labour in the republic could concentrate on building their party here as an All-Ireland entity

[seanad voter]

As a former member of the Trinity College Dublin Labour Party branch, I tried to help get Irish Labour to set up in NI (and specifically my native Derry) in the late 80s and early 90s and they wouldn't. They said the SDLP was their sister party in NI and Labour supporters there should vote for them. A similar answer came from London when we pressed the UK Labour Party to establish branches in NI. We were 'nobody's child', unwanted, although some individuual Labour members came from the Republic to assist in local elections.

I stood as a Labour Coalition candidate in Fermanagh/South Tyrone in the Constitutional Talks election in the mid-90s along with 2 others. While we didn't get elected ourselves, the votes we garnered across the North cumulatively were enough under the electoral system employed to ensure a Labour presence at Stormont. It was a start.

But the terribly disheartening aspect of campaigning in the North is that so many people are preoccupied with the Border and the Union and that's the first question they put to you - "Are you for or against the Border ?" Yes, they will agree with you that the things Labour is concerned with - jobs, housing, the health service, schools, all the bread and butter issues - are all important, but they will still decide to vote for or against the Border and Union as their first priority.

I would welcome Irish Labour into the North but they will have their work cut out when the first question they have to answer is "Do you want to do away with the Border ?" If they answer honestly, they will immediately alienate about half their potential supporters.