MOMENTUM founder Jon Lansman warned today that the future of a socialist Labour Party “hangs in the balance” ahead of forthcoming elections to the national executive committee (NEC).
                                                  
Mr Lansman, a veteran Labour leftwinger who established the pressure group in 2015 after Jeremy Corbyn became party leader, is running alongside eight other socialists and trade union activists on the “#JC9” slate.

He warned supporters that the NEC’s current composition was “very finely balanced” and told Labour members that “the importance of these NEC elections cannot be exaggerated.”

Ballot papers were sent to paid-up party members yesterday, with voting to conclude on August 30.

Mr Lansman reminded Labour members of the “duplicitous” actions of the party bureaucracy in 2016, during the abortive coup attempt against Mr Corbyn’s leadership.

“They tried to keep Corbyn off the ballot, banned tens of thousands of members from voting and had the cheek to charge 180,000 new members £25 to vote,” he recalled.

Mr Lansman warned that changes to Labour’s internal structures proposed in the Democracy Review, overseen by left-wing former MP Katy Clark, could fall to a “single vote.”

The proposals, seen by Corbyn supporters as a necessary democratisation of the party’s opaque structures, include weakening the influence of its MPs in leadership contests by lowering the threshold of MP nominations needed for a contender to make it onto the ballot.

Other plans advanced in the Democracy Review include increasing the representation of constituencies, regions and trade unions on the NEC, reforming the party’s youth and student structures and radically reforming the parliamentary selection process.

These moves, both supporters and critics say, would help enshrine a permanent socialist presence in the running of Labour.

Mr Lansman added: “It is clear we’re on the right track. While many social democratic parties across the continent are withering away and scrabbling for answers, Labour is ahead in the polls and has more members than at any time in its history.

“This is because of our bold socialist vision and our commitment to build a different kind of political party.”