I’ve had time to read the EHRC Report now in full and I welcome it. The Labour Party will no longer be able to get away with running a shambolic and corrupt Complaints system. In future where there is wrongdoing the Labour Party will have to act. The fact is that the Labour Party was running a Complaints system that had inadequate resource, failed to deal with complaints in a consistent manner and was run by people who were not trained sufficiently to deal with the complexity of cases.
I’ve been making complaints to the Party about its complaint system for two and half years now and the Report has identified its inadequacies well. Whether Ian McNicol or Jennie Formby were in charge they denied and arrogantly batted away all criticism directed at the Complaints process when members complained. We now all know that the Complaints process was rotten and an embarrassment to the Labour Party. I hope now that people who are still waiting for the Party to deal with their complaints will have them dealt with in a timely manner.
Up until now the appalling Complaints system have consistently ignored complaints and failed to reply to their letters and emails. As we know the Party nearly suffered the indignity of a full blown investigation by the Information Commissioner for failing to deal with Subject Access Requests. This was always totally unacceptable. So hopefully people on both sides of the arguments can unite to welcome the Report for forcing the Labour Party to face up to its own inadequacies and make its Complaint Process fit for purpose. That battle is won and I look forward to the Report being implemented in full.
It will be nice to know going forward that when you make a Complaint to the Party or ask for a Subject Access Request to be honoured as the law requires then it will be honoured. If we have a Complaint system that is professionally run it will mean that antisemites are kicked out of the Party as quickly as possible but also that members who have been smeared by trolls will also have recourse to justice instead of being ignored by a Complaint system that was not accountable to anybody.
I’ve sent all of my evidence about staff corruption to the EHRC inquiry and it does acknowledge that in 42 of the 70 cases they looked at the Party dealt unfairly with respondents. The EHRC Report backs up what I have been saying i.e. that the Party Complaints system was so inept that it was unable to cases in an adequate way and left members tearing their hair out. I took my evidence to the EHRC Inquiry, the Information Commissioner, the Forde Inquiry and the Dorset Police because my complaints to the Labour Party Complaints unit were ignored.
Luckily the Party will now have to face up to it’s incompetence. Justice will hopefully be served in future. If you are racist there is no place for you in the Party and if you smear fellow Labour Members with lies then the Complaints system will find you out, deal with you and expel you. Everyone in the Party should welcome that.
I’m now going to resubmit a specific complaint I made to the Party over two years ago and they had better deal with it this time. If they don’t I will go back to the EHRC. People in the Party should do the same if they have never received an adequate response to a complaint they’ve made or received their Subject Access Request.
Damien Stone
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