Breaking New Ground: Members’ Report 2023

Open Labour was founded to give voice to Labour Party members who believe in a practical, open-minded and inclusive type of democratic socialism.

We want to deliver Labour to all levels of government, and for the policies Labour implements to be both credible and ambitious.

We are grassroots and member-led, and everything we have achieved since our founding in 2015 is thanks to the work of volunteers. The immense dedication of our members means that Open Labour often punches above its weight.

Here are some of Open Labour’s highlights since our last members’ report:

• Several Open Labour members have been selected as Labour parliamentary candidates across the country, including in Labour safe seats like Camberwell & Peckham and Huddersfield, which will grow Open Labour’s presence in Parliament at the next general election.

• We won our priority campaign at Labour Party conference 2022. The Proportional Representation motion was passed by an overwhelming majority of delegates.

We continue to work with Labour for a New Democracy to secure a manifesto commitment on voting reform. Labour’s National Policy Forum 2023 brought new breakthroughs on electoral reform and a motion for First Past the Post was decidedly seen off.

• We published our biggest ever Position Paper, which gained coverage in The Mirror, LabourList, Independent Labour Publications and The Social Review. We continue to campaign on a range of issues, from child poverty to LGBT rights.

Many of our policy positions have been pledged by party frontbenchers to be in the next manifesto and/or passed on the 2022 conference floor, such as private rental sector reform and public-owned rail and mail, which we are very pleased to see.

• We held an incredible event ‘Our Last Best Chance’ at the UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) , hosting parliamentarians and speakers from Brazil, Italy, Ireland, Greece, Scotland and more.

• We held bold and buzzing rallies at Labour Conference 2021 and 2022, with guests like the Leader of the Irish Labour Party Ivana Bacik, UCU President Janet Farrar, frontbenchers David Lammy, Jonny Reynolds, Louise Haigh, and many more. We are currently organising the next rally for October 2023, stay tuned!

• We have championed foreign policy issues, from our emergency Afghanistan statement with support from Human Security expert Professor Mary Kaldor, to our campaigning in solidarity with Ukraine.

• Open Labour has had success in Labour Party elections; All Open Labour members who ran for the new Labour Students committee won their elections. We are represented on Labour’s highest governing body, the NEC, by Ann Black and formerly by Alice Perry (who was Chair of the NEC Sept 2021 – May 2022).

• We have advocated for Open Labour’s values through our growing podcast and participating in events with organisations such as the Electoral Reform Society, Compass, LGBT+ Labour, and Make Votes Matter.

• And we have fun too: Our yearly fantasy football league continues to be a hit, these days drawing in members, councillors, parliamentarians (and even a Shadow Secretary of State or two) to compete for an Open Labour signed T-shirt.

This is just a snapshot of what we have achieved, and we’d like to say a big THANK YOU to all of our members and volunteers who make it possible.

You can read the previous members’ report here: https://openlabour.org/a-year-in-the-life-of-open-labour/

We look forward to continuing to grow Open Labour, as we lay the administrative groundwork to be able to hire our first member of staff, as well as looking to a general election and campaigning for a Labour landslide.

Join Open Labour today at openlabour.org/membership.