December's Discussion Meeting

         DRONFIELD LABOUR PARTY DISCUSSION MEETING


TOPIC  :         TOWARDS LABOUR'S ELECTION MANIFESTO

SPEAKER :   ANDY FURLONG

TIME :            8pm to 9.15pm

DATE :          SUNDAY, 14th December

VENUE :       CONTACT CLUB, SNAPE HILL LANE, DRONFIELD




Andy is the most experienced member of Labour's National Policy Forum (NPF) within the East Midland's Region of the Labour Party, having served on that body since 1998. Labour adopted a series of policy forum documents at its recent Annual Conference which will shape its General Election Manifesto. Andy served on the Policy Commission which produced a document entitled "Living Standards and Sustainability" and dealt with numbers of key items; including transport, energy, water, long term sustainability, rural communities, food safety, animal welfare and the natural environment. He has also been fully involved in the processes which led to the shaping of Labour's Programme, which was then endorsed at Conference. On the NPF, Andy consistently spoke out for matters such as investment in public services, better access to affordable social housing and the need to move to a low carbon economy. He lives near Leicester and is Director of Policy at the Institute of Chemical Engineers.   

For my own (rather lengthy) summary of the Policy Forum Documents, click here and follow its links
     Harry Barnes

Labour's Coming Electoral Programme

The General Election is only six months away. If Labour is to make an impact, it needs to start pressing its electoral programme now. It has no problem in doing this, for after considerable inner-party discussions it came up with a final version of its agreed proposals at its recent Annual Conference. The document containing these proposals is entitled "National Policy Forum Report 2014" and it can be found here.  It is, however, 218 pages long and needs sorting out into more manageable chunks. This needs doing before it can be distilled into an even easier-to-handle electoral manifesto. In case no-one is sorting out these matters at the moment, I am trying my hand at doing this in a series of on-going items on my own eight year old blog, which is entitled "Three Score Years And Ten". Each item I post will cover a single broad aspect of Labour's Programme and I give the Policy Forum page references for each of the sub-points I refer to.  The current leading item on my blog shows how to link into my earlier items in this series - see here. 

November Discussion Meeting

  

TOPIC  :        TRANSATLANTIC TRADE AND INVESTMENT PARTNERSHIP (TTIP)

SPEAKER :   JOHN HEALEY M.P.

TIME :            7pm to 8.15pm

DATE :          SUNDAY, 9th NOVEMBER 2014

VENUE :       CONTACT CLUB, SNAPE HILL LANE, DRONFIELD
 
Please note that this meeting will be held an hour earlier than is usual. Access to the meeting room will be provided around the back of the building. 

 


Since 1997 John has been the Labour MP for Wentworth and Dearne. Between 2002 and 2010 he held Government posts in the Treasury, Local Government, Flood Recovery and then Housing and Planning. When Labour went into opposition, he served as Shadow Minister of State for Housing and Local Government and then as Shadow Secretary of State for Health. He currently Chairs the All Party Parliamentary Group on EU-US Trade and Investment, which seeks to promote awareness and informed debate on the topic of his talk - the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), which is a proposed free trade agreement between the European Union and the United States. It is a measure which is currently being negotiated and has wide ranging economic and political implications.

October Discussion Meeting

        DRONFIELD LABOUR PARTY DISCUSSION MEETING


TOPIC  :         REPORT BACK FROM THE LABOUR PARTY CONFERENCE

SPEAKER :   JEAN INNES

TIME :            8pm to 9.15pm

DATE :          SUNDAY, 12th OCTOBER

VENUE :       CONTACT CLUB, SNAPE HILL LANE, DRONFIELD

 


Jean (above) was a delegate to the Labour Party Conference from the North East Derbyshire Constituency. She will give us a report of its work. The Conference dealt with the "National Policy Forum Report 2014", which will shape Labour's Election Manifesto for the 2015 General Election.

Jean is the Labour County Councillor for the St Mary's Electoral Division in Chesterfield. She is also a Labour Borough Councillor for the Old Whittington Ward in Chesterfield  and is Chair of their Customer and Organisational Scrutiny Committee.

September Discussion Meeting

        DRONFIELD LABOUR PARTY DISCUSSION MEETING


TOPIC  :        SHOULD SCOTLAND VOTE "YES" OR "NO" ?

SPEAKER :   ANDREW WILSON

TIME :           8pm to 9.15pm

DATE :          SUNDAY, 7th SEPTEMBER

VENUE :       CONTACT CLUB, SNAPE HILL LANE, DRONFIELD


This meeting will be held just eleven days before the referendum, which will decide whether Scotland will remain part of the United Kingdom.

The speaker, Andrew Wilson lives at Lossiemouth near the Moray Firth in the north of Scotland. His home overlooks the birthplace of Ramsay MacDonald who was Labour's first Prime Minister. Andrew is a retired optician.

He is a lifelong member of the Labour Party. In the 1960s he was the Secretary of the Eckington Branch of the Labour Party and delegate to the North East Derbyshire Constituency Labour Party.  He retains strong links with our area and he has attended our discussion meetings during past visits.

We are fortunate to have Andrew to lead us in a discussion on the key issues and implications around the impending Scottish Referendum.

July Discussion Meeting

  DRONFIELD LABOUR PARTY DISCUSSION MEETING


TOPIC:           ATTITUDES TO WELFARE REFORM
 
SPEAKER:      ROSIE SMITH

TIME:              8pm to 9.15pm.

DATE:             SUNDAY 20th JULY, 2014.

VENUE:         CONTACT CLUB, SNAPE HILL LANE, DRONFIELD.






Rosie (above) is Chair of the Dronfield Labour Party and is a member of both the Dronfield Town Council and the Unstone Parish Council. She has been selected to stand as the Labour Candidate for Unstone in the coming North East Derbyshire District Council Elections. She holds a BA in Politics and an MA in Political Theory. These are both from Sheffield University, where she has also been working as a Graduate Research Assistant.  She is looking to engage in further academic research in the subject area of her talk.