We have been sent these model motions for CLPs to submit to London Labour Party conference (2-3 March) by Clarion-supporting activists. We have also been promised motions on Brexit and on Labour councils and migrants (‘No recourse to public funds’).
Each CLP can submit one motion. The deadline for submission is 1 February. The word limit is 250 words and 10 for the title; the content must refer to London. If you want help to send us any others to publish, email theclarionmag@gmail.com
TRANSPORT FOR LONDON
This conference condemns the savage cuts in funding to Transport for London by the Conservative government, which expects London Underground to be the only major metro system in the world to run without public subsidy.
This conference notes:
1. Transport for London’s plans to cut bus routes and London Overground ticket offices, adversely affecting working-class areas and access to public transport for poor and disabled people.
2. That cleaners on London Underground and elsewhere on TfL are employed by contractors and agencies at very low rates of pay, with minimal rights to sick pay and leave.
3. That TfL has awarded it stop bosses pay rises of up to 74%.
This conference would expect such policies from a Conservative Mayor and GLA, and is seriously disappointed to see them implemented by a Labour administration.
This conference further notes that Labour Party members will be campaigning for Labour’s candidate for Mayor this year, and wish to do so on the basis of progressive, socialist policies rather than having to defend indefensible policies such as those listed above.
This conference calls on Labour’s Mayor and GLA members to:
1. Launch a major campaign against the funding cut rather than implementing it with minimal protest.
2. Abandon its plans to cut bus routes and close ticket offices.
3. Boost the pay of its workers,especially the lowest-paid, rather than its highest-paid managers.
4.Bring contracted-out services such as cleaning, catering and maintenance functions into direct TfL ownership and control.
(241 words)
BUILD A CAMPAIGN TO STOP AND REVERSE COUNCIL CUTS
Labour council leaders have warned that Tory funding cuts are pushing London councils to “breaking point”.
Cuts since 2010 have seen London councils lose 60p out of every £1 in 2010 core funding. By 2020 cuts will approach 65pc (over £4 billion). Next year London councils face £235 million more cuts, with many hundreds of millions more after that.
This despite rising demand for vital services such as emergency support and child protection.
London councils’ per capita ‘spending power’ has fallen 37pc in real terms, compared to 29pc for the rest of England, at a time when our population is growing rapidly and we already have higher poverty rates.
However, this is not a matter of special pleading: we oppose all cuts and want to win decent funding for the whole country.
We welcome the LGA Labour Group’s call to reverse next year’s planned £1.3 billion cuts; immediately invest £2 billion in children’s services and £2 billion in adult social care to prevent collapse; and, crucially, restore funding to 2010 levels by 2022.
We need the party to lead a vigorous national campaign for these demands. We call on the leadership, council leaders and unions to meet urgently to develop such a campaign.
Meanwhile London Labour will:
• Launch a mass national petition, in electronic and physical form, for these demands.
• Organise a mass London demonstration with these demands, also inviting people from outside London.
• Encourage the holding of meetings in every borough to build the campaign.
(249 words)
TO FIGHT POVERTY AND INSECURITY, REPEAL THE ANTI-UNION LAWS
We note that, as well as being home to some of the richest corporations and individuals in the country (and the world), London is also home to some of the worst poverty and deprivation. The Trust for London has found that 27pc of Londoners live in poverty after housing costs, against 21pc in the rest of England.
However, that is not all. In recent years London has been home to many impressive and inspiring struggles against poverty and insecurity, including by precarious workers not previously involved in the labour movement. Cleaning and facilities workers at institutions including Senate House, LSE, SOAS, Goldsmiths, the Royal Opera House, the Barbican, Ferrari, the MoJ and Kensington and Chelsea council; Picturehouse and Curzon cinema workers; McDonald’s workers; and couriers for CitySprint, Uber Eats and Deliveroo – to name a few…
Reviving union organisation and struggles is crucial to tackling poverty. But all moves in this direction are hamstrung by the numerous anti-union laws introduced between 1980 and 2016.
We strongly welcome the unanimous call by national conference 2017 to “repeal the Trade Union Act and anti-union laws introduced in the 1980s and 90s”; andt he unanimous call by conference 2015 to “legislate for strong rights to unionise, win recognition and collective bargaining,strike, picket and take solidarity action”. (Conference 2018 reaffirmed the next Labour government should “abolish anti-union laws”.)
We call for the whole party to explicitly and actively campaign for this policy. London Labour will campaign explicitly and actively for it.
(249 words)
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