Labour MPs are to express concern to the party leadership about the attendance of the chief whip, Nick Brown, at a Momentum conference where a motion was passed calling for the mandatory reselection of MPs.
The Newcastle East MP, who replaced Rosie Winterton as chief whip after Jeremy Corbyn’s re-election, was a keynote speaker at the Momentum North event in Newcastle on 3 December, which had about 250 attendees.
Sitting MPs are not subject to mandatory open reselection, but delegates at the meeting unanimously voted to introduce open selections for candidates on a one-member, one-vote basis. The vote is not binding on Momentum’s national policy.
MPs fear the change in the political makeup of their local memberships since thousands joined the party in support of Corbyn could result in many of them being deselected if open procedures were introduced.
Currently local members can only deselect their MP under a trigger ballot system by which local party branches and affiliates vote to accept or reject their nomination. If the MP loses that support, they face selection by all members and rival candidates can stand against them.
Parliamentary Labour party (PLP) representatives are expected to raise Brown’s attendance at the event during a meeting with the party leadership on Wednesday.
One Labour MP said: “It’s all very well to want to bring the band back together, but this is a group which has been demonstrating outside Labour MPs offices over the summer.”
MPs also said they would write to Brown with their concerns about his attendance but the issue was not raised during Monday night’s PLP meeting. The discussions there centred on Labour’s fourth place finish in the Sleaford byelection.
Brown used his speech at the Momentum conference last week to call for unity after the bitter leadership challenge to Corbyn over the summer, where more than 80% of MPs voted for a motion of no confidence in the Labour leader but who easily defeated challenger Owen Smith in votes from members.
“First and foremost, I think the party has to accept that Jeremy won fair and square and is the leader of the Labour party,” Brown told the conference, according to LabourList.
“It’s up to the rest of us to support his leadership and to make sure that the parliamentary Labour party can work in a single-minded, united and effective way, standing up for Labour’s core values, holding the government to account, setting out our alternative agenda and giving an example of unity to the rest of the Labour Party and more generally to the Labour and trade union movement. That’s what I’m setting out to achieve.”
A Momentum spokesperson said: “Momentum is not campaigning for mandatory re-selection or the deselection of any MP. Selections are a matter for local party members and affiliates in accordance with Labour party rules.”
