Battersea has All Member Meetings. Which means that anyone who is a member can attend all of our meeting!

It's also worth checking out Labour's guide How We Work and Unite the Union's excellent guide to how the Labour Party works.

Labour Party jargon buster

CLP – Constituency Labour Parties

This is your local Labour Party, which is matched to the parliamentary constituency you live in.

BLP – Wards & Branches – Branch Labour Parties

Wards are electoral areas for local elections, branch is the collective term for all party members in a ward (or wards), who usually hold branch meetings once a month.

EC or Exec – Executive Committee

This is the Executive Committee of your local party; branches can elect members to be delegates who attend then report to and from each body. The EC also has delegates from local trade union groups or affiliates to the Labour Party (see Affiliates).

LCF – Local Campaign Forum

This is the committee for all the CLPs within Wandsworth, which each CLP sends delegates to. They have the final say on who stands for council seats and campaigning plans for local elections.

AGM - Annual General Meeting 

Once a year the local consituency Labour Party holds a meeting where we elect members to the Executive Committee. This is your chance to vote for the Chair, Secretary, Women's Officer etc of our local party. In Battersea, all members are welcome to come to the AGM. Each branch will hold its own AGM, just for members living in that branch.

Labour Group 

This is made up of all the Labour Councillors in the local government authority.

Chair

The person who will sit at the front and guide the meeting and discussion. A good Chair should not get involved in the politics of the meeting, but help all members get involved and make the meeting a comfortable place to be. CLP Chairs will also work closely with elected politicians to make sure the CLP is always kept informed and involved.

Secretary

In the Labour Party’s structures the CLP Secretary has the most important job in the CLP, making sure that the democracy of the Labour Party is carried out correctly in each constituency. They will often also take minutes of CLP meetings and deal with correspondence.

Treasurer

The Treasurer in the CLP is often the one who will inform the meeting of the CLP’s financial situation. They may also be the one passing round the traditional ‘bowler hat’, ‘pint glass’ or ‘mug’ for the raffle

CLP Officers

These are the people who perform different roles in the local party. These include a Youth Office, Political Education Officer, BAME and Equalities Officer, Environment Officer. New Officer positions can also be created at the Annual General Meeting (AGM).

National Executive Committee (NEC)/ Regional Board

These are the people that help to keep the democracy, politics and finances of the Labour Party in order. The NEC is the Committee of the National Labour Party, in Wales there is the WEC (Welsh Executive Committee), Scotland has SEC (Scottish Executive Committee) and each region has a ‘Regional Board’. There are different representatives on these committees from all sections of the Labour Party including a Youth delegate, and representatives from Trade Unions and affiliates. They also decide on candidates in by-elections and which seats will select candidates from All Women Shortlists (AWS).

NPF – National Policy Forum

This is the committee of the Labour Party that gets together to discuss the policies that the Labour Party should have, as well as creating the general election manifesto. It is made up of representatives from the regions, including a youth rep for each region, as well as delegates from affiliates and trade unions.

Affiliates

These are the wider part of the Labour Movement, they can be trade unions other groups such as the Society for Labour Lawyers, Labour Students or Chinese for Labour who pay a  fee to ‘affiliate’ to the Labour Party. They have a say in internal elections normally through a college system and can also affiliate to local constituency parties.

GOTV – Get out the Vote

This is the process that happens on election day to get Labour Party supporters and voters to go and cast their ballots.

Motion

A carefully worded proposal which proposes action to be agreed or undertaken. Motions should be seconded by another member and are put to the vote at meetings after speakers for and against. If an amendment is proposed they have to follow the same procedure as for motions. If passed, the amended version is put to the vote and is either passed or rejected on a simple majority.