Another Europe is Possible is holding a byelection to fill a vacancy on its national committee. Below are the statements from each of the candidates. They are listed in alphabetical order, and will appear in a random order on your ballot paper.
There is one vacancy for National Committee and each member of Another Europe can cast a vote. If you are not already a member of Another Europe, you can get a vote if you join us by September 1st. Join here.
Voting closes at 23:59 on Monday 2nd September.
Shaista Aziz
My name is Shaista Aziz, I’m a journalist, an anti racism and equalities campaigner and a Labour councillor in Oxford. I’m co vice chair of the Fabian Women’s Network and Oxford and District Labour’s Women’s Officer.
I’m the co founder of the Labour Homelessness Campaign and Intersectional Feminist Foreign Policy. I’ve spent more than fifteen years working as an aid worker with a number of international organisations including Oxfam and MSF. I’ve worked extensively with women and children impacted by war, sexual violence, conflict and the climate crisis across East and West Africa, the Middle East including Syria, Iraq and Palestine, and across Pakistan including the countries tribal belt bordering Afghanistan. I’m a left international socialist and believe the local, regional and international are interconnected. I’ve been an active member of Another Europe is Possible for more than a year and have contributed to the running of workshops and public speaking at events advocating for the left to unite under a radical left socialist agenda and to stand up to the far right, neo-liberalism, austerity and climate crisis denial. I recently recorded a podcast with AEIP about the need for the left to develop and Intersectional Feminist Foreign Policy rooted in anti racism and focused on class and women’s rights.
Christopher Ford
I am a member of Walthamstow Constituency Labour Party, I organised AEiP in Walthamstow, we’ve undertaken a range of activities, public meetings, leafleting etc. Raising the profile of AEiP locally, showing that there is a radical internationalist campaign against Brexit and winning support in the Labour Party.
I am GMB member and active trade unionist for 35 years, currently a Regional Official of the teachers union. I have organised numerous strikes and campaigns in the private and public sector, I was the initiator and an organiser of the IWGB and its founding General Secretary. In 2007 I was part of John McDonnell’s leadership campaign team, organised the John4Leadernational event at Shaw Theatre. A member of the Editorial board of Debatte and organizer of the ‘Ukraine Solidarity Campaign’ in supported labour and social activists in Ukraine. I have written widely on labour history including Editor of Borotbism: A Chapter in the History of the Ukrainian Revolution and co-author of 1839 The Chartist Insurrection.
Pauline King
Over my lifetime I have memories of life pre EU and would never want to go back to that time and how lives have changed after joining the EU, thanks to their social policies. As an older person I know many older people voted to remain in the EU. I feel it is important to represent all ages and all walks of life rich or poor, healthy or disabled. Everyone should be entitled to a voice and for it to be heard. As a mother and grandmother it is important we work to stay in the EU for our children and grandchildren’s sake.
Dylan Morris
I’m running to be on Another Europe Is Possible’s National Executive Committee because I believe that Scotland needs a seat at the table. So many pro-European campaigns focus on England and leave Scotland, and its majority Remain vote, behind.
I’ve been in politics for over ten years, and have managed both local and regional campaigns. I know how to run a winning campaign and have done so on many occasions. I think my background and skills would be a real asset to AEIP, and I think that I have what it takes to help us continue to build a strong left-wing movement that is in favour of remaining within a reformed social Europe.
I’m asking for your vote because I’m passionate about Europe, and always have been. I want to see a European Union that is progressive, socialistic, and cares about its poorest. Most importantly I see the UK as being an integral part of that progress. We need to lead within Europe, not leave it behind.
Sarah Roberts
Remain, Reform, Revolt. These three things seem so fundamentally important now, if we are to stop the slide to a meaner, marginal future. I have spent my whole career driving social and environmental change and I am currently Executive Director of a successful not-for-profit organisation, which has a strong focus on human rights and climate change. I live in Derbyshire, in a leave voting constituency, and work half the week in our London office staffed with internationally-focused EU citizens, and I desperately want to find a path that enables us to escape the madness of Brexit and develop a positive future that addresses some of the root causes of the Brexit vote.
I am a member of the Labour Party and the Women’s Equality Party and an experienced strategist and campaigner. Having just spent the last three weeks travelling across the Netherlands, Germany, Finland and Estonia by bike, train and boat with my teenage children, it is so clear that another Europe, in all sorts of variation, is indeed possible. I feel that I can add useful skills to the AEIP team to ensure that we can stop Brexit and create a positive progressive future for all of us.
David Taylor Gooby
I live in Durham, and was previously a District Councillor in Easington for twenty years, so I know the problems of neglected areas which are far from London. I am currently Chair of Scrutiny for the North East Combined Authority.
A Labour Member for 50 years, I am a veteran of the 1975 Referendum when we successfully campaigned for Remain. I currently convene a Durham Group for ANIP and we have successfully held public meetings with Chi Onwurah, Roberta Blackman Woods and Anna Turley. We have also had regular street stalls in Durham, South Shields and Jarrow, and have door knocked in Leave areas such as South Shields and Jarrow since it is important not simply to speak to the converted but to take the message to Leave voting areas.
I believe we should remain in Europe not to accept the present system, but to build a better one. We want to have more influence in the world to fight the reactionary policies of Trump, Bolsanaro etc, but also to build a better life for our people here, particularly in neglected areas such as the North East where I live.
Please give me your support.
Julie Ward MEP
I have been a Labour MEP for the NW of England since 2014 and was recently re-elected. I came into politics purely to defend the social Europe that I believe is possible – and I am still defending it! I am an anti-austerity politician but I am not tribal about my politics – I campaigned with AEIP during the 2016 referendum campaign, speaking on the platform with Green Party members, Left Unity, trade union comrades, NHS campaigners and others. I am a member of Momentum, Labour for a Socialist Europe, Open Labour, and an active member of the anti-austerity Progressive Caucus in the European Parliament. I attend the annual gathering of the European Left Forum – Marseille 2017, Bilbao 2018 and Brussels (forthcoming) 2019. For 30+ years I worked in the field of arts and culture, including many European youth projects. I am now Vice Chair of the parliament’s Culture and Education Committee and a member of the Economic and Monetary Affairs and Regional Development Committees. I have a parliamentary responsibility for relations with Bosnia Herzegovina and Kosovo which gives me an interesting perspective on the dangerous effect of Brexit in the Balkans. I support Freedom of Movement.
28th August 2019