I was privileged to be part of a Voice 4 Change England panel discussing the Lobbying and Immigration Bills along with Conservative former Boris Johnson adviser Kulveer Ranger, Labour shadow communities secretary Hilary Benn and my old anti-racist movement colleague Claudia Webbe, a Labour councillor.
I have written a few blog pieces on immigration so will limit this article to the Lobbying Bill. This Bill proposes to clamp down even further on the ability of charities and trades unions to ‘campaign’ during an election.
The fundamental flaw running through the Bill like a stick of rock is the assumption that campaigning on issues could constitute “preferment” for individual candidates or parties. This is nonsense; charities do not tell voters who they should vote for, they raise concerns in their area of expertise and leave it up to the public to make up their own minds.
Even Labour-affiliated…
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truelabour 