Tom Baldwin, South West Socialist Party regional secretary
Cornwall Trades Council president Rob Rooney has been expelled from Your Party and barred from standing as a candidate for the party’s Central Executive Committee (CEC). Rob’s 300-word CEC candidate statement sketched out his 40 years of experience as a trade unionist and fighter for the working class. The positions to which he’s been elected to represent workers include shop steward and lead negotiator.
Rob’s statement also explains his campaigning record: instigating and leading a successful community campaign to stop an abattoir expansion in Preston, East Yorkshire, 20 years ago; to today playing a similar role in the campaign to have Fowey Hospital, Cornwall, re-opened. He has also been the chair of Lanteglos-by-Fowey Parish Council since 2023.
Rob’s statement says that he is involved in leading Cornwall Trades Council’s ‘Needs Budget for Cornwall’ campaign, which has been praised by Jeremy Corbyn for taking on council cuts and fighting for services for local residents.
Rob says: “By demanding need is met rather than ignored on the grounds of cost (while billionaires proliferate and billions are spent on bombs) councillors, senior council officers and trade union officials are challenged and held to account. By defeating capitalism at home, making billionaires history and distributing the wealth we create ‘from each according to their ability, to each, according to their need’, we strike a blow for the Palestinians and all oppressed people.”
The decision to expel him, according to an email sent by Marion Roberts, Treasurer, Your Party, on 11 February, was made “in light of your amended statement of candidature”. However, Rob’s statement has not been amended.
Rob has never hidden that he is a Socialist Party member. It was written plainly in black and white in the statement he submitted when applying to be a candidate, three weeks before his expulsion. Rob’s statement ends by listing his current memberships: “Your Party, Socialist Party, Unite Community”.
It was this statement that encouraged enough Your Party members to endorse him to earn him the necessary 75 nominations to get on the ballot paper. In fact, at the time of writing, his statement is still on the Your Party website and Rob is still listed as a candidate for the South West, presumably meaning that people can cast their vote for him but that these won’t be counted.
The letter barring him from the election came from the Your Party treasurer, not Andrew Jordan, the returning officer, who is meant to be conducting the election. Both are unelected and acting in an interim capacity.
No reply to Socialist Party letter
On 7 January, Hannah Sell, Socialist Party general secretary, wrote to the Your Party leaders on behalf of the Socialist Party, to seek confirmation that members of our party are eligible to stand in the elections to Your Party’s CEC. No reply was received. A number of potential candidates were then blocked at the start of the election process, including Socialist Party members Dave Nellist, a former socialist Labour MP, and April Ashley, a current executive member of Unison representing black members. (see ‘Letter to Your Party, from the Socialist Party’)
However, Rob’s case seems to be the first time a socialist has been removed from Your Party membership. In an email of a few terse sentences, Rob was informed that he is “ineligible both to be a member of Your Party and to stand as a candidate” and that “the relevant teams will be informed and will take appropriate action.” No process of appeal was mentioned, nor has been given in response to Rob asking.
Top-down bureaucratic manoeuvres of this nature will not deliver the “democratic, member-led socialist party… with the working class at its heart” that Your Party claims to be.
