David Miliband Urges Labour To Let Non-members Have Say In Candidate Selection

I wonder if David Miliband has completely gone of his trolley to suggest the non party members should have a say in our selection process, he needs to come off his high horse and comeback to reality and start to listen to the grass roots members of the labour Party

Foreign secretary says party needs to change because 'traditional political structures of mainstream political parties are dying'

The foreign secretary, David Miliband, wants Labour to hold US-style primaries. Photograph: Martin Argles

David Miliband today renewed his call for the Labour party to let non-members have a vote in the selection of candidates.

In an article in Tribune, the foreign secretary said the party needed to change because "the traditional political structures of mainstream political parties are dying".

He said Labour should hold US-style primaries when selecting parliamentary candidates, instead of leaving the decision to local party members as it currently does.

The debate about primaries was reignited this week by the Tory primary in Totnes.

The Conservatives, and some MPs from other parties, judged it a success after more than 16,000 voters – almost 25% of the constituency's entire electorate – took part.

There are various models for holding a primary. The Tories have drawn up a shortlist in more than 100 seats and allowed the final selection to be made at a meeting open to both members and non-members.

In Totnes – for the first time in Britain – the party gave every voter in the constituency the chance to take part by sending them a ballot paper with the names of all the candidates on the shortlist.

Miliband advocated a third approach in his article, suggesting Labour should adopt a system of "registered voters" – supporters, but not party members – and allow them to vote for parliamentary candidates, a system common in the US.

This would help the party "tap into the energy in communities, ensuring we reflect the problems of the future, the power structure of the future and the people of the future", he said.

He also suggested pledging that some of the money raised by party fundraising would go to charities or voluntary groups, to show Labour's commitment to corporate social responsibility.

He also advocated developing Labour's relationship with the three million trade unionists affiliated to the party.

Miliband, who has urged Labour to consider primaries before, also suggested the party should learn from some of the techniques adopted by Barack Obama's US presidential election campaign and by the Greek socialist party Pasok, the only European socialist party to do well in the recent European elections.

Obama "removed barriers to participation" by scrapping party membership fees, Miliband said, and Pasok has allowed 900,000 Greeks, out of a population of 11 million, to support the party as members or "friends".

"The party has quotas for male and female representation, open primaries to select party candidates for local elections and has developed 'every day a citizen' - an organisation dedicated to citizen engagement," Miliband wrote.

"Such engaging and deliberative party structures enable Pasok to tap into the energy in communities and multiply the force of a national message through local, authentic and committed advocacy, with resultant electoral success."

Other Labour figures such as the Olympics minister, Tessa Jowell, David Lammy, the higher education minister, and Frank Field, have also urged the party to adopt primaries.

But officials are sceptical about the benefits and there are currently no plans to change current selection procedures.