Construing grassroots internal elections as an authoritarian cleanse is part of the smear campaign against Momentum by those terrified by its successHide your kids: those dastardly undemocratic reds are coming again! The front page of one Murdoch outlet nowadays carries wild reports of Moderates forced out by tough left in Labour purge”.
What has actually happened is this: Labour is choosing candidates to stand as councillors in next year’s local elections. In some cases,members contain democratically decided that some sitting councillors should face an open contest. This happened automatically until a rule change last year. Calculating that they will lose to a leftwing alternative, some contain stood down. Others contain lost. This is not a “purge”. This is what is known as “democracy”.
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Source: guardian.co.uk