How many votes can you have in Labour's leadership contest?

The Labour Party has a new recruitment campaign. It is telling supporters that if they join, they will have a chance to choose the next Prime Minister.

What an offer. A chance to choose between Gordon Brown and, er, perhaps no one else. Where do I sign?

But if you really want to have a say in this thrilling contest, why stop at joining the party? I suggest you also:

• Join all the levy-paying unions you are eligible for (there are at least 16 and you may be able to join more than one)
• Join the Black Socialist Society
• Join the Christian Socialist Movement
• Join the Fabian Society
• Join the Jewish Labour Movement
• Join the Labour Campaign for Lesbian and Gay Rights
• Join the Labour Disabled Members' Group
• Join the Labour Housing Group
• Join the Labour Party Irish Society
• Join the Labour Students
• Join the National Union of Labour and Socialist Clubs
• Join the Scientists for Labour
• Join the Socialist Education Association
• Join the Socialist Environment and Resources Association 
• Join the Socialist Health Association
• Join the Society of Labour Lawyers; and if you can
• Become an MP and
• Become an MEP

As far as I can work out you don't actually have to be Jewish, for instance, to be a member of the Jewish Labour Movement or a scientist to join Scientists for Labour. It appears that you can join all these organisations at the same time.

And all of them offer you a vote as part of Labour's electoral college.

So the Labour party offers you one vote, but if you are canny you can have up to 34 votes.

I think I'll offer a prize to the Labour supporter who manages to acquire the largest number of votes.

Comments

[John Reid]

As I have already chosen myself to become the next (and last) Prime Minister (during my life time), the whole thing seems rather pointless. Because, the votes have already been counted and believe it or not I have a landslide majority of 100%. At present I am busy writing my autobiography called My Struggle...

[Citizen Andreas]

I see that there are no votes to be gained by being a Labour blogger.

Bloody Typical.

[Chris Gillibrand]

As the son of a retired trade union leader, I would ask that you also offer a prize to the non-Labour supporter who manages to acquire the most votes.

As a small aside, I write this from Austria which has been without an effective government for months. The genteel decline of society which I see all over Europe has not been halted neither has it been accelerated.

There was a superb Freudian slip during the New Year´s Day celebrations in Linz. The commentator announced as "As we begin the year 19.....".

As a Left-Right "grand" coalition (as ruled in Austria for most of the post-war years apart from the most recent in this millenium) is quite likely to enter power on the 11th January in Austria all that is left is the power of the interest group and the lobby so well summarised by the list of Labour Party interest groups.

One wonders exactly what influence modern government really has.

[Jonathan Sheppard]

Do you think the Labour Party has taken the much used anecdoate about how more people vote in the X factor than a General Election a bit too literally and gone for the vote often approach.

[David Boothroyd]

Daniel, you are exhibiting an unusual degree of simplicity in this post. You talk of "34 votes" when what that means is that you will get 34 individual ballot papers. The actual proportion of the total vote is very different for all of them. The MPs and MEPs get the most influence, individual members get the next highest, but levy-paying members of trade unions and members of socialist societies get next to none because there are so many of them. I think it's going to be very difficult for a newcomer to the Labour party to be elected a Labour MP by the time of the leadership election.

Not that I wish to deter anyone from joining the Labour Party and any socialist societies, of course.

[Chris Paul]

Oi Finkelstein - don't I get a vote for being a member of the Co-op Party? And presumably the AMs and MSPs also get a vote (ignored in arithmetic below). But as David Boothroyd points out some of these votes are worth more than others and the affiliated bodies ones (all of these apart from MP, MEP and ordinary membership are worth diddly squat. MEP/MEP ones are worth almost 0.1% EACH, CLP (ordinary membership) ones are worth around 0.0002%, and affiliate ones are worth only about 0.00001% of the total selectorate. The lower turn out in the second and third groups will boost the influence of individual members but this will not be much better than the 500th and 10,000th of that of parliamentarians.