16.04.2026

Funeral games

Secret votes, gagging orders and hunting down whistleblowers. Yet, apart from rotten politics, there is nothing to hide. By imposing a needless bureaucratic dictatorship and purging the left, the Corbyn clique is killing what it imagines it is protecting. Carla Roberts reports

Jeremy Corbyn is a tragic figure. Having been at the storm centre of one of the biggest witch-hunts in British political history while he led the Labour Party, he is now conducting his very own witch-hunt in what will soon be a corpse. Thousands have already voted with their feet. Now the majority of the central executive committee (CEC) of His Party, meeting on Sunday April 12, has decided to simply overturn the December launch conference’s decision to allow ‘dual membership’. Members of left and socialist organisations are now banned. There is even a proscribed list.

As an aside, not only were all votes at this April 12 Zoom meeting held in secret, but CEC chair Jenn Forbes did not even announce how the vote went! Motions were simply declared as having “passed”. Needless to say, all the motions moved by the 14 members of Corbyn’s leadership faction, The Many, passed, while everything moved by the nine supporters of Grassroots Left was defeated. There was one rather amusing incident, however, where an amendment moved by GL CEC supporters miraculously passed, as Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi outlined in a meeting organised by YP Connections:

It’s because the Zoom poll had the wrong section number on it. So, when the Zoom poll result was announced, our amendment had passed. And then the chair started saying, oh, um, I seem to have misled people I’m really sorry, we’ll have to re-run that vote. And we said, hang on a minute, there’s been a vote, you can’t just decide to rerun it. What had obviously happened was that the people in the meeting were just voting according to a list that had been sent around, telling them to vote for this one and against this one, by number. And, although the content was actually in writing on their screens, and was read out and everything, when it came to voting, they all voted as if it was one of the amendments they’re meant to approve. I thought that was hilarious.¹

That incident goes some way to dispel the idea that the Corbyn clique is trying ever so hard to act in a ‘non-factional’ way. CEC meetings are very clearly run and orchestrated by Corbyn’s right-hand woman, Karie Murphy, who is planning things in great detail.

As a reminder, this is the motion on ‘dual membership’ that 69.2% of members who voted at the YP launch conference were in favour of:

Option A: Dual Membership with aligned allied parties: Members shall be permitted to hold membership in other national political parties where they have been approved by the CEC as aligning with the Party’s values, to include those with whom the Party cooperates electorally. The approved list shall be subject to ongoing CEC review and annual ratification by National Conference.

But no such “approved list” was presented to the CEC - instead Murphy had drawn up a banned list of nine socialist groups, who are “deemed not to be aligned to our party’s values and [are] proposed as ineligible for the purposes of Your Party membership”.

Although it was the Corbyn leadership itself that had drafted the various limited ‘options’ that members were allowed to vote on at launch conference, it now clearly feels no need to actually implement anything it now dislikes. The first move was to do away with ‘collective leadership’ by installing the position of ‘parliamentary leader’ - for Corbyn, needless to say. And now, dual membership has been effectively done away with.

Repeating history

Instead Your Party has followed in the footsteps of the Labour Party bureaucracy in the 1920s and drawn up a list of proscribed organisations. In the 1920s the prime target was very much the CPGB, and that remained the case up to and including the cold war. In the 1980s Militant Tendency was added to the list and in the immediate aftermath of Corbyn, the list was extended to include Labour Party Marxists, Labour Against the Witchhunt, Socialist Appeal and, strangely enough, the Alliance for Workers Liberty.

YP’s proscribed list consists of “Socialist Workers Party, Alliance for Workers’ Liberty, Socialist Party, Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition, Communist Party of Great Britain (Provisional Central Committee), Scottish Socialist Party, Socialist Equality Party, Revolutionary Communist Party”.² Why are they proscribed? “These organisations maintain independent national political structures, membership organisations and internal discipline. Their internal organisational models and strategic objectives are distinct from and incompatible with the values and constitutional framework of Your Party. These organisations stand candidates in elections.”

Of course, the YP proscribed list is a very mixed bunch. The Northite SEP would not touch YP with a barge pole. The Woods-Sewell RCP has long gone. But the others would have wished to openly stand candidates under a YP umbrella. In fact, the only group given a reprieve - probably temporarily - is due to stand almost 300 candidates in the May local elections: SPEW’s electoral front, the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition. This decision, due to an amendment moved by Sam Gorst, makes little sense, of course, as many Tusc candidates will indeed be SPEW members. But then, rationality is usually the first victim of any witch-hunt.

As an aside, when Niall Christie wanted to take the SSP out of the banned list, Forbes insisted: “We cannot possibly discuss individual groups” - as GL CEC rep Sophie Wilson explained in a Zoom report-back meeting organised by Sheffield Left.³ There are very clearly different rules for different groups. GL supporter Mel Mullings moved an (unsuccessful) amendment to remove all banned organisations and another amendment proposed a ‘six months’ “amnesty” - of course, they were all voted down.

The CEC paper pushed through also contains the helpful addition that “the list is not exhaustive” and, indeed, the next point states:

The constitution should also apply to any organisation that operates as a democratic-centralist party or organisation; maintains its own national political membership structure, requires political discipline and accountability to an external leadership or programme. Such organisations would automatically fall within the scope of the ineligibility rule.

It is pretty clear that the rules are written in such a way as to apply to any group - and would be implemented as soon as any members cause a problem or embarrassment. Funnily enough, Socialist Action, the secretive Stalinoid sect that political officer Louise Regan is a member of, is not on the list - and, perhaps, it never will be.

A pre-written email, sent out straight after the CEC meeting, is a masterclass in Orwellian newspeak: “Today, Your Party invites all socialists and socialist parties to join us in order to build a mass, democratic party where every member’s voice counts. All those willing to join Your Party’s mission are welcome!”

Of course, not a single “socialist party” has actually been approved as “eligible”! In fact, the email clarifies that YP only “welcomes approaches from socialist parties who wish to merge into Your Party, and we are establishing a process to make this possible” (my emphasis). In other words, dual membership has been overturned by the Corbyn clique and there will probably never be a list of ‘approved’ organisations that conference could vote on.

Leaks

How then will this new witch-hunting rule be implemented? The email explains: “Every current member of Your Party affirmed they were not a member of another national political party when they signed up. The issue is therefore one of eligibility for membership, rather than a disciplinary matter. Those who knowingly broke this condition while signing up are simply ineligible for membership, and we wish them well.”⁴

Put simply, Your Party does not have the money or staff for the kind of ‘hot’ witch-hunt that we have seen in the Labour Party, when the compliance unit was massively increased to actively go on the hunt for leftwingers and alleged ‘anti-Semites’, delving into thousands of social media accounts. Instead, the CEC paper outlines that implementation of the ban would be achieved through “self-declaration”, “public political affiliation”; “election candidate disclosures” or “information submitted by members”.⁵

In other words, this is going to be the time of the snitches. We would not be surprised if loyal Corbyn supporters - some of whom are probably still reeling from having been constantly outvoted by the left in their proto-branches - will have been happily taking notes on who is a member of this or that organisation.

Then there is the question of how somebody accused of being a member of, say, the SWP, could prove that they are not? How can you prove a negative? As one person quipped, “I might have to join the SWP first, then officially state that I’m leaving and request proof.” We have seen it all before in the Labour Party, of course.

Ditto the 17-pages-long, very cumbersome and bureaucratic ‘complaints procedure’ pushed through by the leadership faction on April 12: “It’s a complaints procedure which is designed to make complaints about people like us,” as comrade Wimborne-Idrissi put it, and it is not there to hold “the officers and staff accountable”, but protect them from the pesky membership.

The first test case might well be the Weekly Worker. Unfortunately, the majority of the GL supporters on the CEC explained in a statement that they had “agreed not to share the [CEC] paper [on dual membership] ahead of the full report and an open meeting next week”, which will take place on Friday April 17 - ie, almost a week after the CEC meeting. That is a serious mistake, in our view. The comrades are still adhering to the Corbyn clique’s demands for ‘confidentiality’ - even while the witch-hunt against their own supporters is being organised. In all seriousness, what is the worst that could happen to the GL CEC members? Maybe they would get suspended from the CEC for their bravery … but so what? We hear that they themselves complained in the CEC meeting that “there seems to be very little point of us being here”.⁶ Quite. Transparency really should have been the comrades’ main weapon in their fight for a democratic party.

Long story short: When an anonymous source sent us a copy of the paper on dual membership a few days before the CEC meeting, we naturally published it on X and Facebook, where it has been viewed and shared tens of thousands of times.⁷ Members are interested, naturally - it is supposed to be their party, after all. And if we are serious about socialism being ‘the rule of the working class’, then surely we have to act openly and in front of the working class.

At the CEC meeting, Jenn Forbes read out a pre-written lecture about “an unauthorised leak of CEC minutes and associated papers”, which will now be “investigated through the complaints procedure”. Apparently, publishing the paper “undermines the integrity of Your Party”, because “we need confidentiality to operate in good governance”. We dread to think what ‘bad governance’ or a ‘lack of integrity’ in YP would look like.

Departures

We should stress that none of these CEC decisions are borne out of “incompetence” - something we have heard quite a lot in the last few days. Or that Corbyn and his right-hand woman, Karie Murphy, seem to have “forgotten” or are “unaware” of the fact that those they are about to expel are actually the very same people who have been most active in Your Party. The vast number of proto-branches have been set up by members of the organised left - they have the experience, the contacts and the gumption to do it.

That is, of course, exactly the problem for the Corbyn clique. They never set out to build an active, members-led party, despite all the waffle pretending to. They were effectively bounced into setting up YP by Zarah Sultana, after she launched both the ‘appeal for a party’ in July 2025 (which was signed by over 800,000 people) and then, after Corbyn continued to dither, the first membership portal, in September.

But Corbyn does not want a real mass working class party. He remains at best a left Labourite, who still believes in the British road to socialism along the lines of the Morning Star’s Communist Party of Britain. He has no interest in building a party that organises an active working class in vibrant branches and with a healthy culture of discussion and debate - that kind of party would hold its leader to account. And Corbyn certainly does not believe in the need to build a revolutionary party. He thinks that socialism can be introduced by a vote in parliament - and therefore you need another Labour-type party.

Active socialists are a problem for that kind of party - ex-Tories less so. Among the candidates endorsed for the May elections are three councillors who were Conservative Party members as recently as January 2026: Gaz Ali, Amo Hussain, Izzy Hussain - they all sat as Tories on Walsall council. First, they were featured on the published list of candidates endorsed by YP, then they were taken off again after The Canary reported on it - but the leaflets of the three, with a beaming Corbyn in the middle, have already been printed.⁸

We are neither ‘disappointed’ with Corbyn nor are we surprised. It was worth giving it a go - and it is worth staying and organising in YP until we are thrown out. It is, after all, an explicitly “socialist” party (leaving aside that there is no definition of the word), with probably still over 50,000 members. Marxists and communists should make every effort to engage with them and win them over to the vision of the kind of party we actually need.

But, of course, Your Party is now rapidly becoming little more than a Momentum‑style shell of an organisation, with the occasional online vote, and little life in the real world. It will support this and that local independent grouplet, while trying to ride on Zack Polanski’s coat tails, leaving Corbyn enough leisure time to make his pickled pumpkins.

Members are now leaving in droves. Counterfire - even though it is not on the list of proscribed organisations - made it particularly easy for the party leadership, declaring on the day before the CEC meeting: “Counterfire will not remain in a party that expels socialists and, if the motion should pass on Sunday, we will immediately leave.”⁹ In a longer article, published after the vote, Preston councillor Michael Lavalette explains: “The decision to exclude the far left from YP will automatically mean that Counterfire, our members and elected councillors, will now leave YP.”¹⁰

The SWP too seems to be all too eager to do the witch-hunters’ work: “The SWP will not pursue a ‘deep entryism’, where we secretly maintain our own organisation inside Your Party. The key battles are outside the structures of Your Party,” writes Socialist Worker editor Tomáš Tengely-Evans - and then, rather incredibly, holds out his hand of friendship to Corbyn, in true opportunist fashion:

It is welcome that the Your Party statement said, ‘This is not a condemnation of other socialist parties, many of which do vital campaigning work … Your Party looks forward to standing alongside them on the many issues where we agree. Facing the threat of the far right, we must and will work together.’ We too want to work with Your Party in movements and united fronts, such as Stand Up to Racism.¹¹

Bums on seats clearly trumps principled politics - and an ongoing relationship with Corbyn certainly delivers the former.

Then, on April 13, the whole Scottish interim executive committee resigned from YP,¹² including CEC member Niall Christie, an ally of the Grassroots Left, after the CEC majority had voted against all of his amendments, which he had presented under the title of the “Scottish exemption”. The CEC basically confirmed that it had overturned pretty much every decision made at the Scottish launch conference in Dundee in February (which was organised by the ISEC, but was later officially recognised by YP - Jeremy Corbyn even spoke at it). For example, the launch conference voted to put up candidates in the Holyrood elections - but the Corbyn clique ran another email referendum which came up with the result that, actually, no, YP should not stand. That’s exactly what email referendums and online plebiscites are for: to simply confirm what the leadership wants. That is why all democrats oppose such methods of ‘decision making’ - they only give the illusion of democracy.

On Friday April 10, an unsigned email to all members in Scotland simply announced that, instead of organising the election of a permanent Scottish executive in April (as agreed at conference), there will be a “Scottish working party, selected shortly through sortition (a random selection from across the full Scottish membership)”, which would “develop governance arrangements, leading member engagement, shaping initial branch structures, and preparing for Scottish Executive Committee (SEC) elections.” In other words, it wanted to kick the can further down the road and delay, delay, delay.

We do not agree with the ISEC’s politics at all - they are self-declared Scottish nationalists and wanted YP Scotland to be “independent” from the rest of the party too. But the Corbyn clique’s undemocratic manoeuvres will have driven many more Scottish members straight into the arms of petty nationalism.

Thousands had already left Your Party to join the shiny new Greens before Sunday’s CEC meetings - and thousands more are now likely to follow. And it is easy to see why: with over 220,000 members, 17% in the latest polls and its media-savvy leader, Zack Polanski, it looks like a much bigger, much more successful and hugely more vibrant version of Corbyn’s failing vanity project. The soft-left ‘messaging’ is almost identical, but the Greens do it so much better. On paper anyway. As we have reported, the membership appears to be extremely passive and just 700 Greens participated in their spring conference, which was open to all 220,000 members.¹³

Polanski will no doubt continue to play a game of posing left, all the while touting the idea of a European (capitalist) defence pact, as an ‘alternative’ to Nato. He will continue to talk about his support for the Palestinians, while conniving with those in the Green Party apparatus who are against characterising Zionist settler-colonialism as racist. He is touring trade union conferences, while assuring medium and big business that he is no revolutionary - for example, with the amendment agreed at spring conference, which removed a previous commitment to nationalise “the five largest energy supply companies”, replacing it with a plan for “diversity of ownership, including private, public, municipal and community schemes”, so that “consumers will have a choice between diverse retailers operating with fair competition”.¹⁴

He is, in other words, the prime example of a good politician on the make who is covering all bases. He is very much getting the party ready to enter government, albeit as a junior coalition partner. The Greens are and remain a petty-bourgeois formation (ie, they fight to reform capitalism in the interest of the petty bourgeoisie). They might soon enough become a thoroughly bourgeois party, especially if they get called into a potential anti-Reform coalition after the 2029 general election - not an impossible prospect. In other words, the Green Party is not an option for genuine socialists.

Members’ Charter

There is understandable impatience among many on the left of Your Party. But impatience rarely produces anything of particular value or long-lasting. Take the so-called ‘Members’ Charter’¹⁵ produced by Sean Frank in Bristol and Richard Brenner, formerly a leading member of the Trotskyist sect, Workers Power. After many decades in WP, he left a couple of years ago, when WP would not agree with the ‘gender-critical’ theses he had produced. Being a proper sect, it would not allow him to openly discuss his differences on the trans question, for example, in their newspaper, and he was left with no choice but to quit.

He is now leading efforts to set up an “interim association or federation of socialist branches, individuals and groups within and outside YP, as a step towards organising the grassroots-led, socialist party we were promised”. Some 500 have signed the charter in just over two weeks and 140 of those turned up to a first organising meeting on Zoom on April 15. And the eager observer will notice that it contains no politics at all - just these three demands: “Recognise our branches”, “Start campaigning” and “Operate transparently - respect member-led democracy”. That is followed by this ‘threat’: “Should the CEC fail to implement this Members’ Charter by Sunday 10 May, we pledge to convene at a hybrid Member Conference in May to consider the outcome and the way forward.”

It is a very odd set of demands, seeing as the CEC majority has made absolutely clear from the start that it will not implement any of them. For the first week after launching the charter, comrade Brenner was very keen to stress that there was absolutely no implied threat of a split involved … how dare you suggest such a thing? Anybody stating that this was clearly the implied logic was told off for acting in “bad faith” and even accused of “toxic bullying”. He has now changed his tune, arguing for a split and a “new party”. Not having any kind of programme means, of course, that you can travel very lightly and change your tune whenever you fancy.

A number of GL CEC members, who have been working closely with Brenner over the last few months, also (quietly) support the charter - but have not put their names to it.

We really do not think such a diffuse broad-left network, which will have absolutely no politics to begin with, is the right way to proceed. For a start, it is likely to blow up as soon as it is confronted by a difficult issue - say the trans question. Without developing and agreeing a culture of open debate, somebody like comrade Brenner himself would soon be hounded out as a ‘transphobe’.

It is not as though there have not been enough examples of where such broad-left organisations lead: Respect, Left Unity, Transform, etc, etc. They all imploded or withered on the vine - and often pretty quickly. Pretending we all agree on the famous ‘80%’, while ignoring the uncomfortable 20%, has been proven to be a recipe for disaster - not once, not twice, but numerous times. Those 20% include such important questions as what kind of socialism we fight for - and how. Should we just stick to ‘common sense’, easy economistic demands along the lines of ‘free bus passes’ and ‘rent controls’ - or do we need the thorough democratisation of society, with a programme of extreme democracy, as developed by Marx, Engels, German Social Democracy and the Bolsheviks? These are not minor questions that can be solved ‘later’ - the programme very much determines the kind of party we build.

In stark contrast to this stands a potentially positive development in the Democratic Socialists of Your Party, which agreed last week to launch a “Campaign for a Democratic Socialist Party/Communist Party”. This was - by far - the most popular of the various proposals presented on the way forward (which also included a proposal to dissolve the DSYP, one to join the Greens and/or Revolutionary Socialism in the 21st Century, and another one to simply rename the organisation Democratic Socialists of Great Britain - ie, declare itself yet another small party).

This campaign will now be fleshed out some more and the comrades are discussing a draft programme to present to other pro-party organisations, branches and individuals. The aim is to set up a steering committee, which discusses and campaigns for a party “with a clear programme for socialism/communism and a thoroughly democratic and transparent culture, which must include the right to form open factions”. This is to be accompanied by a “Zoom discussion and education series” that could discuss questions around ‘what kind of party’.

It is all still a bit vague and it remains to be seen if the DSYP has the numbers to pull it off, but it is certainly a lot more concrete and welcome than a programmeless, loose ‘federation’. Just ‘bringing everybody together’ and launching a pre-party formation without any programme will create one thing in particular: political confusion and, in no time, further demoralisation.