News from Labour: Neal Lawson has been expelled and Thangam Debbonaire won't commit to stopping Rwanda flights

Neal Lawson, the head of the cross-party campaign group Compass, writes in the Guardian:

Last Friday an email from the Labour party – of which I’ve been a member for 44 years – broke my political heart. They wrote coldly to tell me that back in May 2021, I’d committed a crime: retweeting a Lib Dem MP’s call for some voters to back Green candidates in local elections, accompanied by my suggestion that such cross-party cooperation represented “grownup progressive politics”. My punishment? Expulsion.

I'm told that if you're a Labour member who wants a political career you have to be careful who you're seen talking to. Sometimes it seems internal repression is the only relic of socialism the party has preserved.

And if you are minded to vote Labour because at least they're not the Tories, don't get your hopes up too high. 

Here's Thangam Debonnaire declining to say that Labour would cancel flights of asylum seekers to Rwanda.

Incredible. When asked would Labour stop flights to Rwanda Thangam Debonnaire can’t simply say ‘no’.

After the last 10 years I think the electorate expects straight talking, if nothing else. Answer the question! pic.twitter.com/PKE2FtdcOi

— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) June 29, 2023