Labour Leadership Missing Ballots – Day 17
With just 5 days to go until the final ballots are due to be issued for the Labour leadership election, controversy and confusion surrounds the thousands of missing ballots.
Labour HQ have briefed the mainstream media that votes have only been blocked for 3,000 members who have breached party rules.
The picture on social media is of many thousands of members losing their right to vote, due to arbitrary suspension, or the mysterious non-arrival of their ballots.
In the absence of an official statement from the party of the number of people entitled to vote – including precise numbers of those retrospectively barred for being members for less than 6 months, but then able to apply for the £25 fancy franchise – and the number of ballots issued, speculation is rife.
Regular readers of this Blog will recall my posting updates on a personal quest to get a vote – it is now day 17 of my suspension due to unsubstantiated allegations. I had another frustrating telephone conversation with Labour HQ yesterday, and followed it up with the email below.
My conclusion remains that a right wing clique are working hard to ban Corbyn supporters. Please read the evidence, and decide for yourself.
Hello
Further to emails below, I have today spoken on the telephone to X in Compliance. I gave him my name and membership number, and asked what is required to get my suspension lifted, given that I had emailed two days ago pointing out that I did not Retweet the messages I am accused of Retweeting.
X said that the matter would be investigated by the Regional Director. I pointed out I had previously been told that such an investigation would not take place until after completion of the leadership election. Now that I had seen the evidence, which showed I had not Retweeted the messages, and it was therefore the case that Labour headquarters had made a mistake in suspending me, I asked whether somebody at headquarters could make the decision to end the suspension. X repeated that the Regional Director would investigate. I said there was nothing for the Regional Director to investigate, as I had not carried out the Retweets. I said there was growing evidence that party headquarters were suspending supporters of Jeremy Corbyn, and delaying a response to their appeals. X denied this was the case, and again said the Regional Director would investigate. I asked whether X was really saying that the party could take away my right to vote in the leadership election, due to their mistaken belief I had Retweeted something, and then do nothing to restore my vote when I appealed. X then said he had to check something with his supervisor.
A moment later X said that his supervisor, Y, had told him to tell me that I should contact the party’s legal section, as they would reverse the suspension if I showed that the evidence against me was incorrect. X said Legal were a separate department to Compliance, and could be contacted on legal_queries@labour.org.uk or telephone 0207 7831498.
I telephoned that number, and the call was answered by Z in Compliance. I said I had been speaking to somebody else in Compliance, who said to call this number to speak to Legal. Z said Compliance and Legal were part of the same department, sharing an office and telephone number.
Z took my name and membership number, and I recounted my conversation with X. Z said she could not look into my case at the moment, but guaranteed it would be dealt with soon if I emailed the details to legal_queries@labour.org.uk. I said I had emailed and telephoned the party several times, over the course of being suspended for two weeks, with little response. My latest email two days ago had gone to appeals@labour.org.uk as that was the address specified by the party when they sent me the evidence for my suspension. I said I would email the legal address, but expected, in view of my series of emails and telephone calls, that somebody should be able to give me a guarantee on the telephone today that this matter would be resolved prior to the last of the leadership ballots being sent out on September 14. Z said she would not guarantee that timescale, at which point the line went dead. It appeared that Z had disconnected the call (somebody else in compliance put the phone down on me last week when I pressed for a prompt response).
Please can somebody deal with this promptly and fairly?
Thank you
Andrew Godsell
andrewgodsell 
I am sorry to hear about this happening to you Andrew, in times past any company or organization would do there upmost to keep the Customer/Member happy as their members were and should hold great value. Over the years I have seen change to this Philosophy by a number of organizations to not giving names to whom we are speaking to which exacerbates problems when one rings back and is asked ” “Who Did you speak to” and obviously there is no name to reference, so no responsibility can be attached to anyone. But this is it, the word “Responsibility” there is a word which goes with Responsibility and this is “Remit” where the individual does not have in there contract a remit that says they have to supply or give information which you have shown using X,Y and Z all to do with the Data Protection act. I am sure It all started with Craig David “I am Walking Away” listen to the words there, then there is the “Arm Length Campaigns:” taken up by most Councils so they could point the finger at others, it seems quite a few want the fruit but refuse to climb the tree. A lot like the Wizard of Oz when God hid behind the Curtain, and people frightened of losing their job by doing anything slightly wrong. The so called reason for re-tweeting something is something of an excuse, we are supposed to live in a society of Freedom Of Expression Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights, nevertheless re-tweeing something is asking a question or can be deemed as an opinion which may or may not be right, but this is down to the person reading the words. However, if this is the case most of Mp’s could be suspended for disagreeing with Tory Policies. I sincerely hope you receive your Ballot in time, and as you say you have evidence of not re-tweeting this in itself in ways puts fear into people by gagging speech and their questions.