Comments on: Shukur in pole position in Croydon

By: Hornsey and Wood Green Watch

Hornsey and Wood Green Watch — Fri, 22 Jun 2007 00:14:55 +0000

The problem with the ward/branch shortlisting process - wards interpret that they have to nominate at least one BME candidate, they also have to select at least one female candidate, they wrongly assume that they must nominate from amongst the white candidates for the remaining places.

They are wrong because they must nominate from all remaining candidates (BME and white) for the remaining places, thus effectively they could create a shortlist of just BME candidates. However, with the de facto exception of Brent no ward/branch in the country has ever done this. Instead they have effectively created a white shortlist and a BME shortlist. Usually the BME shortlist just consist of the token one, there are of course exceptions as in the recent case of Hornsey and Wood Green, whom decided to have a BME shortlist of three.

All of this could seem like a bonus if you are both Black and female, consequently from amongst a small number of BME candidates its not difficult to be nominated. As the wards would have you compete against and within your own racial groupings

However, far from being a bonus it reflects a need to increase the representation of BME in the Houses of Parliament inclusive of women.

Given all of this the percentage vote cast at the nomination stage is very misleading. There are many BME women across the country whom have achieved well over 90% if not 100% of the overall ward nominations, well ahead of all other contenders, but have still failed to finish first.

One can only hope for Croydon Central sake that Afsana Shukur’s pole lead is not mere tokeinism and thus the historical pattern is broken.

By: Lady P

Lady P — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 18:27:27 +0000

No - statistics aren’t everything -but Croydon Lad’s point is right -shortlisting is not as easy peasy as it sounds. The recent Croydon Central week’s Shortlisting meeting proved this point when members selected a candidate with 6% over local councillor Simon Hall who had 31%. As to the campaigning skills - If Gerry et al were so good at campaigning how come he barely managed to get over 50% of the ward nominations and the other councillor has yet to fight it over at the shortlisting. Maybe croydon members are trying to tell them something???. Croydon’s demographics is changing, approximately, 1/4 of Croydon’s population is BME and they’re spreading themselves out in the borough. Campaigning skills isn’t the key factor here. The successful candidate must appeal to all voters. Andrew Pelling is a ‘white’ male whose appeal lies in the fact that he is white, middles class, with money. Isn’t it time Croydon had a woman candidate who better reflected Croydon? Afsana is a welcome contrast and she has the additional advantage -that she has no baggage unlike some of her competitors.

By: SV

SV — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 12:55:50 +0000

CroydonLad should re read my post. To the best of my knowledge none of the candidates are being negative. I also said Afsana was very impressive. It was not that hard for her to get onto the shortlist because she was applying under one of the BME spots. The article I was commenting on was making it look as if Afsana was in Poll position. I dispute this. The shortlisting proccess is designed to get a range of candidates onto the shortlist from different backgrounds. Quite different from the process to actually select a candidate which is the stage that the candidates are now on. Clearly all the candidates would do a far better job than the sitting tory MP and that is something that the local party is proud of, even if CroydonLad is not.

By: CroydonLad

CroydonLad — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 12:06:36 +0000

So getting on to the shortlist is easy then!? You havin’ a laugh mate!? What planet are you on!?

..and you seem to infer that Afsana will not be as good a campaigner as Gerry? I believe Afsana and her husband, who is a former Deputy Leader of Tower Hamlets, also have many years campaigning experience for our great party. Indeed, many Labour acitivists are seasoned campaigners - it is a given in most cases and surely not the exclusive preserve of Gerry

Something that is also notable about her campaign - she has not engaged in NEGATIVE campaigning. Some should take a leaf out of her book.

By: SV

SV — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 11:46:58 +0000

Afsana Shukur is very impressive, but the figuers quoted dont actually mean anything. Afsana clearly is working the constituency hard. Getting onto the short list is actually not as hard as it looks. Afsana was automatically shortlisted. All candidates stand a good chance subject to convincing the local members that they can deliver the seat in the actual campaign. Croydon has a very campaign centred Labour party and the Constituency was only lost by a mere 75 votes after a very tough local campaign. I think the constituency will be looking for a candidate with a very strong field campaign record. Taking that into account then local candidate Gerry Ryan is in poll position with the others all some way behind.