Ex-JLM chief Peter Mason launches bid for election onto Labour governing body

Former Jewish Labour Movement leader Peter Mason has launched a bid to be elected on Labour’s ruling national executive committee (NEC).

Ealing Council leader Mason is standing as one of six pro-Keir Starmer candidates on the Labour To Win group slate bidding to make it onto the powerful decision making body in the internal party election.

While the NEC has been critical in pushing through measures to combat antisemitism in the party in recent years, if elected Mason will become the community’s first representative on the body for some time.

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The late former Labour minister Gerald Kaufman had previously served on the NEC.

Confirming his election bid, Mason,38 told Jewish News:”Keir Starmer had the back of the Jewish community, and Jewish members when he set about removing antisemitism from the Labour Party. 

“He knew that changing the Labour Party wasn’t just about making us electable again, but because it was the right thing to do. I saw that commitment first hand and I believe it.

“Now he is Prime Minister, it’s time for us to have his back. That starts with getting people elected to the NEC that will support the leadership as we start to change the country.”

 
The NEC is made up of representatives from each section of the Party – the Shadow Cabinet, MPs, councillors, trade unions, Socialist Societies, Constituency Labour Parties (CLPs), Young Labour and BAME Labour. 

Its primary purpose is to provide strategic direction for the Party as a whole and to work in partnership with the Party’s representatives in Parliament, the devolved administrations and local government to secure the Party’s objectives across the country.

In recent years the NEC has had a pro-Starmer majority amongst its 40 odd members, who also perform crucial roles such as a sitting on disciplinary panels, including some involving antisemitism.

Mason, who joined Labour aged 18, was national secretary of JLM during the critical fight against antisemitism under Jeremy Corbyn, before becoming leader of Ealing Council in 2021.

His colleague at JLM  at the time was Adam Langleben, now director of the influential Progressive Britain group. The pair were key to forcing the equalities watchdog the EHRC to launch their devastating probe into Corbyn’s failure to tackle anti-Jewish racism.

“No one did more that Peter during the bad times to shine a light on the dark recesses of the party,” Langleben told Jewish News.

“He now wants to finish the job we all started and help Keir keep the hard fought wins.

“Labour will be kept in the service of working people because of Peter and other Labour To Win NEC members.

Mason was recently elected deputy leader of the LGA Labour Group of councillors from all across the UK, who were invited to a meeting at Downing Street this week.

Also standing for the NEC election alongside him are Angela Davies, Abdi Duale, Anu Prashar, Jane Thomas and Mary Wimbury.

Meanwhile two new MPs Luke Akehurst and Gurinder Singh Josan, who stood down from the NEC during the election campaign, have been re-elected after their fellow MPs elected the new parliamentarians to fill roles on the NEC reserved for MP representatives in a ballot on Wednesday.

In a further strengthening of the Starmer wing’s influence across the party, Labour MPs this week voted for his  former parliamentary private secretary Jessica Morden to be their “shop steward” as chair of the Parliamentary Labour Party.