Labour rejects selection idea

Press, 10 March 1987, Page 24

Labour rejects selection idea

NZPA staff correspondent London Britain’s Opposition Labour Party, badly shaken by the loss of Greenwich in a byelection, has ruled out suggestions that the leadership should by-pass local activists and appoint candidates in future such polls. Right-wing members of the party have said the selection of a Left-winger, Ms Deidre Wood, seriously hampered Labour’s chances of holding the seat, which was won by the Social Democratic Party’s Rosie Barnes after a collapse in the Conservative vote. Labour’s leader, Mr Neil Kinnock, has said imposing candidates

would be an “offence against democracy.” People raising the proposal were "political illiterates” who should get on with the job of winning the next General Election rather than bickering over the past. “It is not the time to buckle or bend at the knees. I have no time, and this party has no time, for those who would rather win an argument with friends than win an election against enemies,” he told a meeting of Labour members of Parliament, the “Guardian” newspaper reports. While Mr Kinnock rebuked his party’s Right wing, he also saved some barbs - for the Left.