Leicester East and an Anti-Corbyn Banker Named Rishi Madlani

Leicester East’s CLP remains suspended, but yesterday it was announced on the Labour Party’s web site that the selection process for securing a new Parliamentary Candidate had begun. 

The Leicester Mercury was quick to report on this story and quoted Cllr Stephen Bonham, the Labour councillor for Humberstone and Hamilton, as saying “the selection process must be open and transparent.” The local councillor added: “Local members must be given agency with a real choice of candidates, open meetings, hustings and a vote.”

This of course might not happen given Labour’s democratic deficit, and it is far more likely that Sir Keir Starmer will try to impose his own favoured candidate on Leicester East.

Although not reported in the Mercury article, Cllr Bonham also made the sensible suggestion that the Labour Party should probably have let their members know that the selection process opened yesterday. Thus earlier today he said:

“A first step should be notifying all local members that a candidate selection process is underway. On Thursday 5th October I emailed the Labour Party regional office asking ‘When and how will the party notify members that applications are open?’, and stating It ‘is essential for Party democracy that all local members are made aware, are able if they choose to apply, or to encourage others to apply’.”

Leaving the selection process aside for a minute, rumour has it that Starmer’s preferred candidate for Leicester East is an eco-banker named Rishi Madlani, a Labour councillor based in London who supported the failed right-wing campaign of Liz Kendall in the 2015 Labour leadership elections. After this epic fail, Cllr Madlani then went on to be one of the many right-wing Labour councillors who actively campaigned against Jeremy Corbyn when he was the Labour leader.