Outrageous statements made at the DaWN GC

At tonight’s Dulwich and West Norwood CLP GC meeting in addition to electing eight members to represent the CLP at the Labour London Region Conference nominations were sought for the London regional Board. 

Of course, the meeting was split along factional lines, after all we at the micro end of politics tend to copy those at the macro end, and became quite heated, sometimes fractious. 

Anyway, a bloke called Peter Day raised a point of order. The Chair gave way to Day. Day complained that some people were without ballot papers. He then continued bloviating about the manner in which the information on nominees for the Board had been circulated.

He was told that information on the nominees had been electronically circulated. Day then complained that not everyone can access the information, thus disenfranchising them from the democratic process.  

Maybe he had a fair point, maybe not. But, the Chair ruled him out and called for the proceedings to continue. However, by now Mr Day was very angry with the Chair, and possibly the world in general, and decided to ratchet-up his scorn for the Chair and proceedings that obviously didn’t chime with his worldview of things. 

Not satisfied with the Chair’s ruling Peter clinging onto the microphone declared angrily: 

“This is the way benefits claimants are treated when applying for Universal Credit. They are forced to claim the benefit online!”

What kind of person would seriously compare some CLP members who didn’t receive all the information available for an election to a regional board to the horrors of trying to navigate the DWP’s Universal Credit system?

The universal credit is an umbrella benefit system that serves to punish the poorest in our society. People are being sanctioned for falling out of compliance for the most trivial of reasons. Sanctions of 1095 days can be enforced – that’s 3 years without benefit! People are starving. People are careening into debt. People are being evicted from their homes. Homeless people are freezing on our streets. And, people are dying.

Comparing people who are unable to access political party information with those who have to access the very means to live is an utter disgrace. There should be no place in the Labour Party for people who casually make such abhorrent statements, who have a scant understanding of the realities of Tory austerity Britain.