On a much more positive note than my previous post, the email sent out to Alba members tonight states the following: “It is also the case that the Party this year as part of the constitutional review will have the option, if it so wishes, of moving to OMOV for the National Executive elections.”
That, of course, was the proposal that was the centrepiece of my campaign to be elected as Membership Support Convener, and although I very narrowly failed to be elected (having led on first preference votes), I think it’s entirely possible that running with it so strongly may have led to this breakthrough, because once it was on the agenda other NEC candidates started expressing a view on it. If so, it may yet be that I can look back on the frustrations of the last few weeks with a degree of pride. As the saying goes, politics is – or should be – a battle of ideas rather than of personalities, so victory for the idea is more important than victory for the candidate. I didn’t really have a specific legacy as a member of the NEC between 2021 and 2022, so it’s a rather satisfying irony if I’ll have one this time without actually having been elected.
The principle is simple: a party only has an internal democracy if its governing body is directly elected by the whole membership.
* * *
I am currently fundraising in the hope of running a new Scot Goes Pop opinion poll in the New Year – details can be found HERE, and the fundraiser page itself is HERE.
