KEN Macintosh has pledged to start negotiations with the Labour Party’s new national bosses to establish an autonomous party in Scotland within the UK organisation.
It was one of several fundamental changes he proposed yesterday when he formally launched his leadership campaign.
Macintosh said the changes to the way Scottish Labour operates were needed so the party could “win back voters’ trust”.
The Eastwood MSP said Labour in Scotland must become more accountable and responsive to the needs and wants of Scottish people if it is to become electable again.
His reforms included moving the Scottish party HQ from Glasgow to Edinburgh and opening seven regional offices, replacing the Scottish general secretary with a chief executive and giving the elected party chair a seat in Scottish Labour’s Cabinet.
Macintosh said he also wanted to open up the party conference and give non-members – including business people, charities, academics and faith groups – a formal role in policy discussions.
Under his reforms a system of American-style primaries would be established for the election of future party leaders.
Macintosh outlined his vision to an audience at the East Kilbride and District Engineering Group Training Association.
He said: “I want to make it quite clear – I see myself as the change candidate. Yes we could manage the situation we are in. We could lurch from election to election as we have done in the past.
“But I want to change the whole way the Labour Party operates. I want to move away from the machine politics of the past, to give the party back to its members and to the people we want to represent.”
His leadership would seek to assert the “identity, authority and autonomy of the Scottish Labour Party”.
“I’ve never been interested in standing for Westminster and I don’t look over my shoulder or seek permission to say what I want to say on behalf of the people of Scotland,” he said.
“The Welsh Labour Party seems to have had no difficulty in establishing its own identity, with significantly less devolved power or responsibility than we enjoy here in Scotland.”
Macintosh added: “I will begin discussions immediately with Labour colleagues at a UK level to redefine and formalise our relationship.
“I want us to be an autonomous party here in Scotland, but one which makes a positive choice to remain part of the UK Labour Party.
“We will be entirely in charge of our own affairs and our own decision-making, but it is important to us that we have a partnership of equals with party colleagues in the rest of the UK. As I heard it described recently, our future will be one of both self-rule and shared rule.”
On his plan to move the party’s headquarters to Edinburgh, Macintosh added: “It is time the structure of the Labour Party reflected that the focus of political attention in Scotland is Holyrood.
“This will be the head office – we will opt in to the Labour
Party, we will choose to be members of something bigger, but control rests with members here in Scotland.
“Now that is not a step on the road to centralisation, far from it. I am committed to devolution and I want to devolve responsibility within the Party to eight regions reflecting the list regions of the Scottish Parliament, with membership and campaigning organised at that level.”
As well as changing the general secretary’s role to that of a modern chief executive, and making the party chair a member of the Cabinet, Macintosh said he would put all elected representatives on an equal footing within the party.
He said: “As part of the process of reclaiming the party on behalf of the members, I want to open up the policy process so that it is more transparent and so that members and those outwith the party can become directly involved.
“The annual conference would be less of a stage-managed rally and more a place of real discussion and debate. We will debate any and every issue.
“I would invite contributors from the voluntary sector, from the private sector, from faith groups and academia to directly contribute.
“In fact, rather than charge them thousands of pounds to attend, I would abolish fees for third sector and non-profit-making organisations.
“I want to broaden our appeal, not narrowly focus on an ever-declining audience of Scots with so-called traditional Labour values; not solely concentrate on former industrial heartlands in the central belt, but reach out to every place and part of Scotland.”
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