Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Labour Party Selection Fraud in St Ann's
After it was discovered at the St Ann's Labour Party selection candidate selection meeting that there were people present and voting who should not have been, I came home from the pub (where I'd heard about it) and wrote this article. It has subsequently been edited by site admins to remove the names of people who were embarrassed or in the final case where a journalist said it was potentially libellous. Well here I will attempt to summarise what we have subsequently found out and hopefully take people's attention away from my original appalling rant.
Back in May (The Ward AGM):
- The St Ann's Ward AGM was convened on Thursday the 23rd of May instead of the usual first Wednesday of June by the then Ward Secretary, Barbara Blake.
- Protests were made by members about this but they were rebuffed by the Ward Chairman.
- At this meeting The current Ward Secretary resigned and there was bloc voting to decide the new Ward Secretary.
- A person in the bloc opposing John Blake turned up late and was prevented from voting despite there being nothing about this in the Labour Party rules.
- John Blake was elected Ward Secretary by one vote.
The Selection Meeting:
- The meeting was run by The Secretary of the St Ann's Labour Party , and Steve Hart from Hornsey & Wood Green.
- A candidate who arrived early noticed the five members arrive with Ali Gul Ozbek, sensed that something was up and mentioned it to Barbara Blake. When the other candidate seemed unhelpful they mentioned it to Steve Hart. Then the candidate went looking for the five people but was barred from entering the room (3o minutes before the selection) by the Ward Secretary.
- By the time one member I have spoken to arrived, the five members were seated at the back of the room. Four men and one woman (who works in Ali Ozbek's Pharmacy).
- A blonde woman turned up before anyone had started speaking but was barred from entering the room by the Ward Secretary, despite remonstrating with him.
- Barbara Blake won in the first round (to select a female candidate) against Zena Brabazon and Emine Ibrahim by two votes. It was 11/1/14. Everybody voted.
- It is alleged that one candidate knew the questions in advance and had prepared answers.
- At the appropriate point in the meeting the secretary asked if everyone was OK with the others in the room and everybody laughed.
- There were various factions voting together in the room; the five new members, Charles Adje's family, Zena and David's people and the Ward Secretary's people.
- In the final round Ali Ozbek and Peter Morton were selected, beating Zena by one vote.
- Ali is a local chemist and businessman on Green Lanes who seemed very passionate about what should be done with St Ann's and spoke eloquently about the need to reduce business rates. He is also a property developer.
- At the time Peter worked as head of press for the Labour Party.
- Barbara is a trade union official and ex Ward Secretary.
After the Selection Meeting
- A fellow councillor calls David to commiserate with him.
- David Browne and Zena Brabazon did some investigation using the St Ann's Labour Party membership list and the electoral roll.
- They discovered that nineteen new members signed up that year did not actually live in St Ann's and that they had either given Green Lanes business addresses when they signed up or claimed addresses in the ward.
- Not one of these new members, many of whom were recruited on the 8th of July gave an address in the ward at which they are eligible to vote, which is required by party rules.
- Five of these members were "eligible" to vote because they signed up before the cut off date of the 30th of April, however they should have been barred from voting because they do not actually live in the ward.
- Zena and David wrote to their local Labour Party officials who sent their evidence on to the London Labour Party.
- Nobody can tell me for sure where Ali Ozbek lives but he claims an address in Finsbury Park Avenue.
- Ali Ozbek has donated money to the Labour Party.
- According to a twitter exchange with a Labour councillor in another ward, the membership list should have been gone through before the meeting by the person running it to make sure this kind of thing did not happen, it was certainly done in their ward.
- When one of the five members who voted was called at his home his partner informed the caller that he had been in Turkey for a while and was not due back yet.
- In Harringay several new Labour Party members were registered using Green Lanes business addresses but not before the cut off date.
- Barbara Blake has told local traders that it is OK to register as a member in the Labour Party from a business address (it is definitely not) and the Tottenham Membership Secretary has expressed a similar view in a meeting, only to be corrected.
The "Corruption in Haringey Labour" article.
- After I wrote the original article, in which I also made some allegations against Claire Kober, the only phone call to site admins was to remove the Secretary of the St Ann's Labour party's name from the discussion.
- There was a lot of comment on the original thread and as of Saturday the 12th of October it appears to have been viewed more than 7000 times, although I dispute that as a useful metric (I think the actual figure is much lower).
- After some badgering it was picked up by an overworked Stephen Moore at the Tottenham Journal, here.
Trying to get a re-run
- I have pushed the councillor who commiserated David on his loss on Twitter to join calls asking for a re-run of the election but they have resolutely refused, to the point where it's all a bit weird and "la la la, I can't hear you".
- As it stands the London Labour Party have agreed that the five people were not eligible to vote but they say that this was not picked up before or during the meeting so the result stands. Their investigation consisted of speaking to the Ward Secretary and Steve Hart. Steve Hart lied because someone did speak to him before the meeting.
- The London Labour Party have the attendance list and will not release it, presumably because it shows that people were not identified correctly and that at least two of the five were imposters.
- Appeals to the NEC have all been rebuffed, even with the full acknowledgement of what went on.
The Labour doorstep in Harringay
- The St Ann's Labour Party have a great deal of trouble getting members to help them out with canvassing. A photograph has been tweeted showing more than 20 people out in Harringay Ward above the same session in St Ann's, with just two.
- When David Lammy, after a lot of badgering apparently, stepped out in St Ann's for the Labour doorstep he was met by a picket of local men calling on him not to support the St Ann's fraudsters. As I understand it he will not be going out with them again.
The Police are involved
- On Monday the 10th of February Haringey MPS made a visit to me on behalf of the secretary of the St Ann's Labour Party and his partner.
- It was alleged that I had called him filth on Twitter (which I have not, that was someone else) and that I said "I know I'm hassling you but...". I was served with a Notice of Harassment Letter which will now appear in extended CRB checks.
*An individual has asked that their name be replaced with their function in this post on the grounds that they are not seeking public office. This has been done.
Tags for Forum Posts: election2014, labour, st ann's labour, stanns
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Protheroe O'Shea on
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Perhaps, but the Lib-Dems should be going for the jugular. They love getting news out about Labour's failings, but have been pretty damn silent on this matter. It makes me wonder if the others have one or two skeletons in closets as well.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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I hope it's no worse than festering. Clive. Because with proper treatment, a suppurating wound can be healed.
Did you see the Independent's story on the row about Tory MP Anne McIntosh being deselected in Thirsk and Malton? There are allegations - as the independent puts it - that "local activists played fast and loose with party rules in their determination to sack their sitting MP".
I think that "playing fast and loose with party rules" would be an accurate if over-polite way to describe what happened in St Ann's. One difference is that the Tories' rules now stipulate a postal ballot for all the members of the Thirsk & Malton Constituency.
The Labour Party doesn't have such a procedure for its ward branch selections. But it would be fascinating if it did. Not least because they'd face the problem of where to send the ballot forms of all the "members" who live outside the ward.
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Permalink Reply by Clive Carter on
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INCIDENTALLY, it is no surprise to me that the public fight for transparency in the troubled St. Ann's Ward is championed by a Kiwi.
On the global Corruption Index, our homeland currently ranks equal #1 with Denmark, as one of the world's least corrupt countries.She has long been up with the Scandinavians in this regard.
Here is Transparency International's latest global Corruption Perception Index.
(Punters are invited to scroll down to check out some of the outfits populating the other end of the scale.)
As a fellow NZer (and better yet, a Wellingtonian!), I trust John's instincts in this matter. And his determination.
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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on
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Well thank you very much Clive. No doubt it will gladden your heart to hear that of the four men who tried to picket David Lammy from campaigning in the ward a couple of weeks ago, three of them were New Zealanders. There were a couple of people who didn't make it because of a snafu with the time though.
Incidentally I don't think any Labour big cheeses will officially show their faces in St Ann's again. They're effectively ASBO'd out of the area.
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Just having a read of the Labour Party internal inquiry in Falkirk (marked Strictly Private and Confidential of course) that the Guardian leaked. Interesting.
I've said it before but I'll say it again, if you intend to vote Labour and live in a ward that is more than likely to go Labour, you should join the Labour Party. Your vote is worth a thousand times more at these selection meetings and it is the only thing that will stop this kind of shenanigans.
If you can't bring yourself to do that or want to send them a signal, join the Cooperative Party.
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Permalink Reply by 1sc9rygewokvc on
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....or the Green Party! Never heard of the Cooperative Party before ? Any relation to the Co-Op Company, if so wonder what their policies are regarding 'ethical' banking? Shame I would've opened an account with them if it wasn't for the recent scandal !
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OK Adrian, just for your benefit I will explain the point that I made, which I thought was obvious but I perhaps muddied with the reference to the Cooperative Party. Members of the Cooperative Party are also members of the Labour Party. In Haringey they're pretty much the same thing. This means that you can take part in selecting candidates in the Labour Party by being a member of the Cooperative party. Indeed, many prominent Labour MPs are actually Cooperative Party representatives: Ed Balls and Stella Creasy come to mind but there are others.
So there is NO POINT joining the Green Party because they are not guaranteed to be elected, in St Ann's and many other wards in Haringey the Labour/Cooperative Party candidates are.
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Again, many thanks, John, for highlighting this Guardian news story. Apart from the report itself, there's also an analysis by Guardian journalist Rajeev Syal who casts doubt on some of the report's conclusions.
The paragraphs which especially caught my eye are on page 3 of the report in the section headed Background.
"It is not unusual for complaints to be made about all aspects of the selection procedure, but these complaints are of particular concern because of the numbers of members involved."
"The requirement must be that all eligible members of the constituency are entitled to take part in the selection process. In addition there is a general requirement that no individual or faction should recruit members in order to seek to manipulate our democratic procedures. There is a line to be drawn between the normal political processes of recruiting members who support the aims of the party and the recruitment of large numbers of paper members who have no wish to participate except at the behest of others in an attempt to manipulate party processes, which undermines our internal democracy and is unacceptable to the party as a whole.
The word "manipulate" refers to the current Labour Party Rulebook (2013) which includes the following paragraphs in Chapter 2 "Membership Rules. On page 10 we find the following: (NEC refers to the National Executive Committee, the Labour Party's governing body.)
"The NEC may rescind endorsement as a full party member when evidence is provided that the individual concerned neither resides at the address given on the membership system and/or is not on the electoral register and is therefore (subject to 5 above) ineligible for membership; or where evidence is provided that the individual concerned has been claiming reduced rate or registered membership when s/he is not entitled to it under Clause III.1 below."
The NEC shall issue procedural guidelines on issues relating to membership from time to time, including a code of conduct on membership recruitment. In particular, the NEC wishes to highlight the following areas of potential abuse of membership rules:
A. It is an abuse of party rules for one individual or faction to ‘buy’ party membership for other individuals or groups of individuals who would otherwise be unwilling to pay their own subscriptions.
B. It is an abuse of party rules for an individual or faction to offer reduced rate membership to people they know to be ineligible for that category of membership.
C. It is an abuse of party rules for individuals or factions to recruit members who do not live at the claimed addresses in an attempt to manipulate local party meetings or the outcome of party ballots.
D. It is a requirement of party rules for members, where eligible, to register to vote at the address for which they claim membership. It is an abuse of this rule to allow those who are not willing to register to vote for the party to become members of it.
F. Party officers and members should be aware that involvement in such abuses shall be considered as behaviour likely to bring the party into disrepute and prima facie evidence of such behaviour may lead to disciplinary action leading to expulsion under the constitutional rules of the party."
In St Ann's ward with our own mini-Falkirk the Party apparatchiks completely ignored these rules which "in particular, the NEC wishes to highlight".
Given this new exposure of what happened in Falkirk I'm hopeful that St Ann's ward vote-rigging may finally get some exposure in the national press. If anyone knows a Guardian journalist do please mention it to them.
Feeling a strong loyalty to the Labour Party, the people most affected by the vote-rigging and subsequent cover-up decided to go through the formal Party machinery. They assumed the Party they'd been members of for many years was serious about entryism and manipulation of the rules. And so it just needed going "up" the organisational hierarchy until they found someone who understood why flagrant rule-breaking is not "just politics"; or some harmless misdemeanour.
It rots the organisation from within.
(Tottenham Hale ward councillor 1998-2014. My wife Zena Brabazon is one of the deselected councillors for St Ann's ward. The other is David Browne.)
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You do realise Alan, that the Labour Party itself have approved this assassination of Zena (David was not an intended target but they did have to go through him to get to her) in order to silence you, don't you? Well, that's my take on things.
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I don't follow the logic of that, John. Why would attacking Zena Brabazon serve to silence me?
If someone tells me I'm not allowed to know something which seems important to know, I increase my efforts to find it out. If they tell me I'm not allowed to speak or publish about an important public issue, I try to make time to give it what publicity I can.
Especially as a councillor, this can be both a stength and a flaw. There are things which need to be kept private. The best example is someone's private life. So if people want me to tone down my comments, or keep quiet about a public issue, then the best way is to tell me the truth. And then to give me excellent and convincing reasons for keeping something confidential.
The St Ann's Labour Party officers and London Labour Party apparatchiks haven't "assassinated" Zena Brabazon. Nor David Browne nor Nilgun Canver. They're still around. Okay they have been prevented from continuing to represent a ward which needs effective councillors. And three honest councillors will be removed from a Labour Group which desperately needs many more such people.
By the way, please don't underestimate David Browne. If you want to see one reason he was a target look at the webcast of the Scrutiny meeting when they discussed Haringey's atrocious behaviour in the AB & CD case. Compare David's incisive questionning with the embarrassing prattle of Cllr Gideon Bull. And the shameful silence of Cllr Joanna Christophides.
David Browne has some steel in him. Kober and her Cronies don't want people like him around.
(Tottenham Hale ward councillor 1998-2014)
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Because if Zena was not a councillor then you would not get things to leak. That's how they think anyway. I wonder what they're doing next term that they really need to hide from us? Do you think anyone up in the Labour Party has said something like "we've got to stop these riots in Labour run constituencies" and granted carte blanche to the first Blairites to put their hands up and say "but we'd need some help getting rid of dissenting councillors first".
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Permalink Reply by Zena Brabazon on
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Hi John
I suppose its a compliment to be assassinated for having ideas and speaking up. In 2010 I fought hard to save our children's centres from being decimated. Our campaign was successful. At that time I was 'champion' for under 5s - so I championed them!
With Nilgun and Stuart McNamara I argued and fought for more money for enforcement officers dealing with HMOs and also for the Article 4. We were successful.
I've also been open and constant in my defence of local authority community schools.
Having views and ideas like these don't make you popular in some circles.
Zena Brabazon
Councillor, St. Ann's Ward
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