Having imposed a directly elected mayor on Londoners and the London Labour Party, Blair is now intent on ensuring that the most popular candidate, Ken Livingstone, does not get a chance to stand for the post.
He is even rumoured to prefer a `non-politician' like Robert Ayling of British Airways, a staunch New Labour supporter and basher of unions.
Every opinion poll taken shows that Livingstone is the only Labour candidate who could stand a chance of beating the likes of Jeffrey Archer.
This doesn't seem to worry Blair. As far as he and his coterie are concerned they will not allow Livingstone to stand under any circumstances. He is too `off-message' with a murky left past.
Even if Livingstone were to come out as a loyal Blairite for the next 12 months this would not make him acceptable to them. While Livingstone has many faults (a lack of consistency being one) he is clearly on the left and no other left winger has a chance of winning the Labour candidacy or the election.
Other potential Labour candidates include Glenda Jackson, Tony Banks and Pauline Green MEP. Banks may even claim to be the left candidate if Livingstone is included. Blair knows that none of these is likely to beat Livingstone in a ballot, otherwise his solution would be simple - hold an election, Livingstone loses, end of story.
Greater London Labour Party conference in June voted overwhelmingly that Labour's selection should be made by a one member one vote ballot and that all candidates who are nominated by a minimum of 10 CLPs should be automatically shortlisted. When the regional executive (now renamed as the Regional Board) met to consider the procedure they even had to be reminded of this decision.
The regional board has now forwarded proposals to Labour's NEC which include a selection board with representatives from the region and NEC to consider candidates. This mechanism would be similar to the one used to sift unwanted candidates as was done for the Scottish Parliament and European elections. This would allow the NEC to claim that the board rejected Livingstone as `unsuitable'.
The regional board did also, however, agree to `re-forward' the regional conference resolution to the NEC. This means the regional board fudged the issue, leaving the decision about procedure entirely up to the NEC.
The NEC will consider this issue at its meeting on January 26. The intervening period should be used to put as much pressure as possible on NEC members to back the decision of London Labour conference. Union representatives, for instance, should be called upon to support this policy, pointing out that a system of nominations is the only one which allows any input from the unions through GC delegates.
A lobby of the NEC will probably be called for January 26, and this should be supported by as many union and Labour Party bodies as possible to show the strength of feeling on this issue. It is not impossible to inflict a defeat on Blair on this.
This model resolution should be taken up by as many Labour Party and affiliated union bodies as possible and forwarded to the NEC, regional board and regional and national union bodies:
"This ....... notes the meeting of the Greater London Labour Party regional board on November 10 which agreed `a system of self-nomination by potential candidates for inclusion on a panel of candidates for mayor and assembly' and that `a selection board is established to consider candidates'. We further note that this decision has been passed as a recommendation to the National Executive Committee.
This ...... notes that the system recommended by the board removes any right of Constituency Labour Parties to nominate their candidate of choice, and contradicts the decision of the Greater London Labour Party regional conference on June 13 which agreed without opposition that `all candidates who are nominated by a minimum of 12.5% of London CLPs (that is 10 CLPs) will automatically be shortlisted so that their names will appear on the ballot papers to select Labour's candidate.'
This ..... resolves therefore to write to the NEC calling on them to support and implement decisions of the Greater London Labour Party conference on the method of selecting Labour's candidate for London mayor."
(Union bodies should add a call to their own NEC to back this and to demand that union representatives on Labour's NEC support it).
The control freak tendency took another step into the unions last month, as UNISON's London Regional convenor Geoff Martin was threatened with disciplinary action for speaking out in defence of UNISON policy!
Regional full-timer Chris Robbins, clearly acting at the behest of Millbank, has lodged a formal complaint that Martin, an elected lay officer, had "brought the Union into disrepute" by suggesting that UNISON would not support the campaign of any anti-union candidate endorsed by the selection panel.
It remains to be seen if UNISON general secretary Rodney Bickerstaffe will face similar complaints. He correctly lent his voice to warnings by union leaders that Labour candidates cannot count on union funding to run their Euro-election or Welsh or Scottish assembly campaigns if Blair's gang continue to ride roughshod over the demands of union members
Note - UNISON is the largest local government and "white collar" union in the UK. Millbank is the main publicity office of the Labour Party, so-named because it is situated in the Millbank Tower in London.
Socialist Campaign Group AGM December 5th - click for details