Sign the open letter now
Dear Compass Members and Supporters,
Our Executive Director Neal Lawson has had to inform the Board of Compass that he has received a letter from the Labour Party making the accusation that he has committed a Prohibitive Act which could lead to his expulsion from the Party. The accusation is based on a retweeted quote from Neal from May 2021 relating to a local council deal between the Liberal Democrats and the Green Party in Oxford. Neals tweet did not advocate support for any party but simply stated that cross party working was “proper grown up progressive politics”.
The Board are shocked and dismayed by this action. The Labour Party seem to be arguing the even the advocacy of cross-party working is at odds with Labour Party membership. This is simply ludicrous. The Labour Party made its electoral breakthrough in 1906 via a deal with the Liberals. Its 1945 manifesto was founded on the ideas of Liberals. Today Labour is in office with Greens and Liberal Democrats in councils across the country. In Wales, Labour is in government with Plaid Cymru.
As Compass has long argued, the complex challenges of the 21st century are not going to be met by any single party, but an alliance that mobilises every progressive in the pursuit of a good society.
Neal, with the support of the Board, and we hope you, our Compass members and supporters, will resist this self-defeating act. As a matter of urgency, we ask you all to sign up to this letter to Labour leader Keir Starmer calling for the party to develop the right plural cultural approach as we head towards what we hope will be a Labour or Labour led government.
Sign the open letter now
We know where our Compass points, to a future that will be red, green and liberal and therefore plural.
As ever we are grateful for your support – an organisation that is needed now more than ever.
The Compass Board
What a sad world politics has become, all sides seem to spend more time on discrediting each other then working on solving problems. The right of free speech was won by those brave people in the second world war. Fight on Neil for common sense
United we stand. Divided we fall. We must work together, across all boundaries and borders, to bring forward a better, kinder, more humane world for all. I stand with Neal.
I fully support proportional representation, and cross-party solutions to severe problems in society, and find it totally disproportionate to threaten someone with being expelled from the Labour Party for holding such views
I had every intention of voting Labour when the time comes but, having read of the Labour Party’s crass behaviour with regard to Neal Lawson, I really appreciate just how short sighted and lacking in the common sense of progressive politics they are. I am, therefore, thinking very hard about how best to use my vote.
Just want to give my support to Neal. Somebody at Labour HQ is being a nitwit. Hopefully the publicity this has already given will be an embarrassment to the Labour Party.