It’s not a great surprise that Ken Livingstone is a member of Momentum, the Corbynite grassroots organisation that is definitely not at all like Militant, and definitely not going to campaign for de-selections in constituencies. He revealed his membership on BBC News, saying ‘I mean, I’m a member of Momentum. Our task, the first thing we’re focusing on, is getting those two million voters who have been kicked off the voting register by the government’s new rules, getting out to them, getting them back on that register. It’s a campaigning organisation, not some nasty bit of work like the old Militant.
Seb found the same when he spent an evening eating curry with Momentum in Oldham. But ConservativeHome’s Mark Wallace last night attended a Momentum meeting in Lambeth, and found leaflets on each chair from the Socialist Party calling for deselection of MPs. Momentum may well have an official policy of opposing campaigns against deselection, but it is bringing more new members into contact with organisations that support them.
Some Labour MPs I know have become more surprising members of Momentum in order to find out what the group is actually up to, even though they don’t share its Corbynite values.
But what was surprising and significant was that Tom Watson described the group as a ‘rabble’ and an ‘irrelevance’ when asked about it this morning. It may be in Jeremy Corbyn’s interests to preserve Momentum because it gives him an alternative power base, but it is in Watson’s interests to preserve the traditional party structures, and to suggest to MPs that he is on their side in any deselection battles that may involve members of Momentum, given the Deputy Leader is becoming increasingly important in holding Labour together.
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