Assembly Project

Earlier this month, an MP from Labour’s right factions criticised the Manchester mayor Andy Burnham for planning to go to a conference by Compass. His problem? The conference would include members of the Green Party. Naturally, after reading this, I signed up to go, as did at least one other person I met there. Though as it turned out, Andy Burnham couldn’t make the conference due to a change of plans. A very understandable change of plan. Instead, the conference was rounded off by a surprise appearance from the Green Party leader, Zack Polanski.

Originally a movement solely with the Labour Party, Compass became a cross-party group in 2011, primarily through welcoming members of the Liberal Democrats and the Greens. At the time, they said, “We have more in common with Caroline Lucas than Peter Mandelson.” It was even more true than they realised. The conference had well-connected figures from the three parties as well as the worlds of academia, activism and civil society, including the author of a book I’ve reviewed. Compass brings together many people and groups, and overall is neither neoliberal centrist nor ardently radical, but in a firmly progressive middle point.

They have also been growing. Organisers told me that attendance was twice as high as the last one. Their influence may soon increase. There is a high chance that Keir Starmer will be replaced this year by Andy Burnham or someone else from Labour’s soft left. The mood was optimistic overall, but it was tempered. Polls suggest that if a general election were held today, it would bring together a coalition of the far right Reform Party with a Conservative Party that is behaving little better. Even nastier movements lurk on the periphery. It is, as their programme put it, “A moment of great danger but also great possibility.”

From the perspective of this blog, what was encouraging was that there was widespread support for citizens’ assemblies. They were even brought up by Kate Pickett in a talk that focused more on economics. While talking to one member of Compass, I also suggested that political parties should make use of sortition, just like how the Women’s Equality Party used it to resolve their disputes over transgender issues. Still the question remains on how they can be more widely used and accepted in politics, and I have suggested that we need to offer them at a local level.

At another talk, I mentioned the people’s assemblies project I’d helped out with in Salisbury to a panel that included Alan Renwick, a political scientists. On the one hand, it had shown how the ‘Irish format’ could bring many people together to respectfully disagree on some things and widely agree on many others. It had been a great, sociable experience. On the other, there are still many aspects of assembly democracy that we haven’t figured out. It was challenging to bring people in, especially those who were not the usual ‘communitati’. Even more challenging was to turn it into something lasting and meaningful for the community.

Most events were typical of these political gatherings, with a panel taking it in turns to monologue, followed by a Q&A. The catch with these events is that participants are increasingly likely to want a voice, not just to be passive spectators. This was one of the better ones, as they did a round of events where we had a chance to talk in small groups.

It was good to have a chat, but it did show that a small groups discussion needs careful design. My group had 13 members, which was too large, and ended up divided into groups of 8 and 5. It also lacked a facilitator. It was dominated by an argument over a relevantly trivial point about proportional voting systems. It was dominated by the more mouthy members (i.e. me) while some of the shier members barely got a chance to speak.

I agree with Compass that a progressive and democratic future requires not one party, but several, working together with a variety of other organisations. Perhaps the best analogy is an ecology. There need to be many different organisations, testing out different methods and sharing what they’ve found. It is good that they have conferences like this to talk to each other. The next step is talking to everyone else.