How the Local Party Functions

Our Constituency Labour party (CLP) is managed by the members through a General Committee (GC) who elect officers to administer the CLP. Additional co-ordinator roles depend on local needs. Role holders form the Executive Committee which puts into effect the decisions of members, co-ordinate local action and report back to all members.

Officer positions can be shared by a maximum of two members, excluding Chair and Treasurer due to the statutory responsibilities of these roles. The 6 Formal Executive Officers are all voting members of the Executive Committee (EC) along with Branch Chairs & Secretaries who are ex-officio if not already elected, along with Branch Reps and TU & Co-op Party Reps. We as a CLP also invite all Co-ordinators (which we still call Officers locally) to attend Executive Committee meetings to report on their work and share expertise with colleagues and we generally use open debate to create a broad consensus so the EC rarely needs to vote on things and also because it recommends things to the GC (like the Labour NEC does with Labour Conference) we aim to make that the place where most of our votes occur.

These posts at CLP Level are set out in the order the CLP elects them at the AGM based on NEC gender quota guidance for the first two groups of posts and local CLP practice for the rest.

These descriptions may feature a lots of different activities in the Party so there is also a Glossary of Party Terms on this website here.

Formal CLP Executive Officer Roles

These are the 6 formal voting Executive Officer Roles of the CLP ex-officio on the CLP Executive along with Branch, TU and Co-op Party Reps. All bar Chair and Treasurer can be job shared.

CLP Chair
Local parties depend on leadership from the CLP Chair. Other officers look to the Chair to provide support and direction and members depend on their leadership to organise and inspire them in effective campaigns. Effective Chairs facilitate meetings, decisions and ensure the CLP operates fairly. The role requires impartiality, co-ordination, diligence and excellent communication and leadership skills. The Chair is also Deputy Treasurer to the CLP.

CLP Vice Chair Campaigns and Membership

Stands in when the Chair is not available and helps the other officers make sure everything gets done. Has two main roles and so this role is often a job-share:

• Campaigns: Leads on campaign coordination, hence our CLP Campaign Coordinator role is now subsumed into this role to avoid any duplication. Liaises with branches over campaign activities and leaflet deliveries. Set’s up CLP level campaign events and ensures it is organised.
• Membership: Leads on engagement and retention ensuring the local party grows, and members feel valued, are up to date on how they can get involved and get as much as they can out of their membership. They can ensure a local party continues to grow, remaining vibrant, diverse and inclusive. You will act as a direct liaison with our members to ensure the party is an effective unit and all members get as much as they possibly can out of their membership.

CLP Secretary

This role suits an organised individual who can work as part of a team, show initiative and is able to juggle many responsibilities. As Secretary you will deal with correspondence the CLP receives, communicate with members by sending out agendas (in partnership with the Chair) and ensure the minutes are taken and organised for each agenda. The Secretary works with the Chair to plan a whole year of activity in your local area, making sure that the CLP is doing as much campaigning as possible. You will work with the Chair to make meetings fair, interesting and inclusive.

CLP Treasurer

The Treasurer plays a key role, ensuring the local party complies with party funding laws as well as helping the CLP build the resources it needs to run effective campaigns by setting budgets and fundraising targets. Key responsibilities include: ensuring compliance with party and legal rules and guidelines on political funding; keeping accurate financial records throughout the year; producing an
Annual Statement of Accounts to identify and report donations and loans at the end of each quarter; producing a yearly budget and fundraising plan for the CLP. CLP Treasurers are supported by the Governance and Legal Unit at Head Office. If you do have any questions then the Governance and Legal Unit are on hand to help.  Email them at legal_queries@labour.org.uk and they will be happy to assist. Ex-Officio Member of the CLP Fundraising Committee.

CLP Women’s Officer

The Women’s Officer is the key representative of women members on the executive of the CLP, and works to ensure that women are fully involved in the work of the local party. They also take a leading role in making sure that the campaigning work of the constituency
reaches out and engages with women voters. As Women’s Officer you need to be friendly and approachable, organised, able to run events, and above all be prepared to work hard to ensure that women members have a strong voice within the local party.

CLP Trade Union Liaison Officer

As TULO officer your role is to strengthen the link between the affiliated trade unions and the Party at a local level. Trade unions bring the collective voices of working people to the heart of our Party – and this role is an opportunity to build these relationships in your CLP. This role is what you make of it – it is suited to someone who is passionate about the trade union link with great relationship building and networking skills.

Required Functional and Equality Officer/Coordinator Roles

These are officially titled “Coordinator” under Party Rules but we as a CLP still call them “Officer” just to promote equality of titles. All can be job shared. We automatically invite them to the CLP EC and they take part in all our debates as most of our voting decisions go to our GC.

CLP Policy Officer

As your CLP’s Policy Officer, you will have a lead role in bringing the Labour Party’s people-powered policy making process, the National Policy Forum (NPF) to life. It is your responsibility to offer members meaningful opportunities to play their part in developing Labour Party policies, and to help members learn about and engage with current Labour Party policy consultations. You’ll act as a main point of contact in your CLP with the Policy Development Team based in Head Office and will liaise with your regional NPF representatives to help keep your CLP’s membership up to date with and involved in their work, and encourage members to play their part in the policy making process. This role would suit those with an active interest in various aspects of politics, a sound knowledge of, or ability to become familiar with, current Labour Party policy priorities, the Labour Policy Forum website and the policy making process, good organisational and communication skills, and a commitment to empower members by encouraging them to help develop Labour Party policy. A strong CLP Policy Officer will help to facilitate discussions around policy topics, inform members about the process of party policy formation, encourage members to take part in consultation events and formulate policy submissions around issues that are important to them and facilitate their submission to the Party. In our CLP the Policy Officer normally organises an annual Policy Forum Meeting to discuss the NPF consultation.

CLP BAME Officer

As CLP BAME Officer, you’re the key representative of BAME members within the CLP, and you will work to ensure that BAME members are fully involved in the work of the local party, and you’ll take a leading role in making sure that the campaigning work of the constituency reaches out and engages with Black, Asian and Ethnic Minority voters. You should be friendly and approachable, organised, able to run events and above all be prepared to work hard to ensure that BAME members have a real voice within the local party.

CLP Disability Officer

The Disability Officer is the key representative of disabled members within the CLP, and works to ensure that disabled members are fully involved in the work of the local party, as well as taking a leading role in making sure that the campaigning work of the constituency reaches out and engages with disabled voters. You should be friendly and approachable, organised, able to run events and above all be prepared to work hard to ensure that disabled members have a strong voice within the local party.

CLP LGBTQ+ Officer

The LGBT Officer is the local representative of LGBTQ+ members within the CLP, and works to ensure that LGBTQ+ members are fully involved in the work of the local party. They also take a leading role in making sure that the campaigning work of the constituency reaches out and engages with LGBTQ+ voters in the community.

CLP Youth Officer

The role of Youth Officer is to welcome young members into the local Labour Party, help them feel engaged by putting on interesting events and socials, and turn them into active members who campaign for change in the community and to get Labour elected. The Youth Officer will want to build contact with any Regional, sub-regional or borough-wide Young Labour branch and work to help establish Young locally if there is a demand. Youth Officers are also responsible for making sure that the voices of young members are heard and respected within a local Labour Party. A good Youth Officer needs to be friendly and approachable, as well as organised – they should be able to take a lead on events and campaign sessions for young members. They also need to be good listeners, able to understand and represent the views of young members to the Executive of the local Labour Party.

CLP Political Education and Training Officer

As Political Education Officer, it is your responsibility to offer members opportunities for political education, through interesting, informative and dynamic political discussions. It is your job, working closely with your CLP Policy Officer and other members of your EC, to help members to engage with Labour Party policy, and ensure that the campaigning work of the constituency reaches out and informs the wider community about Labour’s message and the importance of participation in politics. This role suits someone with an active interest in various aspects of politics, a sound knowledge of current Labour Party policies, procedures and the party’s history, good organisational and communication skills, and a commitment to empowering people through political education. A strong CLP Political Education Officer will help to provide a programme of relevant, interesting political education events and activities throughout the year. These events may be co-ordinated with CLP meetings, branch meetings, fundraising and/or campaigning activities, or have a purely educational purpose.

CLP Communications and Social Media Officer

The CLP Communications and Social Media Officer plays an important role in ensuring the CLP has a positive, informative and inclusive presence online, as well as working with their regional or national office to increase the profile of the CLP and candidates, and their campaigns in local media. Working closely with other CLP Officers, this role has the opportunity to make a real, positive impact on local campaigns, to improve Labour’s electoral chances in that CLP and its local authority or authorities, and to empower members and supporters to get involved with digital campaigns. This role is suited to someone with a good understanding of social media and local press, and great copywriting and networking skills, as well an eye for an interesting story and a great picture.

Additional Locally Created Functional CLP Officer/Coordinator Roles

These are local roles which Party Rules would describe as a local “Coordinator” that the CLP has had for a long-time and we call “Officer” in order to have equality of titles. All can be job shared. We automatically invite them to the CLP EC and they take part in all our debates as most of our voting decisions go to our GC.

Assistant Secretary

Covers for the Secretary in their absence. Takes notes and passes them to the Secretary for the minutes.

Fundraising Officer

Ensures the local party has the funds to meet its financial commitments and supports campaigning. Chairs the CLP Fundrriassing Committee made up of 4 reps from each branch.

Equality and Diversity Officer

Acts as an overarching equality officer and covers equality strands not already covered by the other equality strand officers.

Inclusion Officer

Focuses on dealing with members if they feel excluded and also works with the Disability Officer on accessibility issues. An inclusion Officer can work with other CLP officers to make it transparent and accessible to all:

• Together with CLP and branch officers, ensure that meetings are accessible. Use videoconferencing to ensure that members with mobility issues or are carers can attend meetings regularly. If a hybrid meeting the venue for will need to include internet access. If not hybrid this may mean holding physical meetings at venues that are easy to reach for all, and at times when most members can attend. This will usually mean holding meetings in the evening or at weekends. It may mean moving the venue around. This is especially important for members with mobility issues or are carers.
• Encourage CLP and Branch Chair’s to welcome new members, ensuring the CLP and  branch is open and friendly, well organised and an open and fair place where members feel involved and have a stake in the direction of the branch.
• Encourage members to suggest agenda items for meetings.
• Support the CLP and branches to all be part of an active, campaigning local movement where members are encouraged to get involved as much as possible.

Community Engagement Officer

Helps develop relationships between the local party and community, identify key issues, and work with community leaders and local people to develop and lead winnable campaigns.

Other CLP Level roles

These are other roles not formally on the EC that the CLP will decide on either at the AGM or at other times::

Auditor

An auditor is elected to audit the CLP accounts. This role does not require monthly meeting attendance. It simply requires action in the months prior to approval of the CLP annual accounts that need to be submitted to Party HQ bwefore the end end of March each year. CLP funds are managed by the Treasurer, with help from the Chair as Deputy Treasurer. It is vital the CLP manages these funds in a transparent, fair and legal way. Auditors are thus vital in ensuring the CLP fulfils both its moral and its legal responsibilities. You will have a good head for figures and finances, and be able to identify problems and discrepancies in the numbers. You will provide a fair and impartial view of the finances presented to members at the GC meeting (usually the third Tuesday in March) that signs off the accounts.

Election Agent

(Note: This may sometimes be a non-CLP member depending on the type of election) Works closely with the candidate(s), Treasurer and Vice-Chair Campaigns and Membership in order to ensure a legal, financially accurate, unified and co-ordinated election campaign. Liaises with Party HQ, Regional HQ, the Returning Officer and other election agents within the constituency during an election campaign.

External Delegations 

As well as electing people to our local internal bodies we also elect delegates to external bodies:

Labour Party Annual Conference Delegates

We elect up to 3 delegates to Labour Party Annual Conference which is usually held annually in September, though there have also been Special Conferences in 1980, 1981, 1995 and 2014. We traditionally elect our delegates to cover conference during an entire year. Other CLPs do elect delegates to a specific Party Conference. A Guide for new Delegates is published by the Party each year and this is the most recent one. All the Reports to the most recent Conference are here. The 3 delegates we elect are:

• Principal Delegate: Must be a woman at least every other year. Holds the Card Vote for the CLP.
• Women’s Delegate: Will usually be a delegate to Women’s Conference too.
• Youth Delegate: Has to be under 27 when conference is held.

Labour Party National Women’s Conference Delegates

We elect two delegates to Labour Women’s Conference which is nowadays usually held annually on the Saturday just before the start of Labour Party Conference in September:

• Principal Delegate:  Holds the Card Vote for the CLP.
• Additional (Equality) Delegate: If a second delegate is sent one of the two delegates must define as Disabled, BAME or LGBT+.

London Regional Conference Delegates

We elect up to 3 delegates to London Labour Regional Conference on a similar basis to Annual Conference delegations. This generally meets every other year but does have additional policy discussion conferences in between too:

• Principal Delegate: Must be a woman at least every other year. Holds the Card Vote for the CLP.
• Women’s Delegate: Will usually be a delegate to Women’s Conference too.
• Youth Delegate: Has to be under 27 when conference is held.

Local Government Committee(LGC)/Local Campaign Forum LCF)

We elect 12 delegates in total to our 2 CLP Borough LGC/LCF under the originally transitional arrangements we agreed with London Region in 2022 which under party rules now seems to be allowed as a “local departure that works”:

• The 6 Formal EC Officers: ex-officio members of the LGC/LCF
• 6 GC delegates: Under our LGC/LCF rules these should aim to include Trade Union delegates, whilst the Borough Co-op Party Branch separately elects 2 delegates direct to the LGC/LCF and 1 to the LCG/LCF EC. Labour Councillors also separately elect direct to both bodies too.

Merton and Sutton Trade Union Council (MSTUC) Fraternal Delegates

We elect two delegates who are generally non-voting (unless a specific vote involving them is allowed by the MSTUC Chair), but have speaking rights, who attend the MSTUC monthly meeting and liaise with MSTUC on local campaigns. They would work together with the CLP TULO and affiliate TU delegates to report back to the CLP on Trade Union matters. This is a long-term historic arrangement in our borough and may not exist in other areas.

Branch Officer Roles

Sutton and Cheam CLP has three branches based on Local Authority ward boundaries. Information on the Branches and Branch Officers is listed on our dedicated Ward Branch Pages:

• Sutton Branch
• Sutton Downs Branch
• Worcester Park and Stonecot Branch

Each Branch Labour Party (BLP) has their own elected structure with Branch Officers.

The Branch

The Branch is the key organisation in any Constituency Labour Party (CLP). It is members’ main contact with the party and is the effective base of campaigning and election work.  It is the job of the Branch Officers to build and maintain an organisation that people want to belong to and one which campaigns effectively and wins elections. We are pretty pioneering as a CLP where we have formal 15 minute branch “break-out” meetings at the start of our GC which makes it easy for newer or newly activated members to quickly be involved in the CLP as they can quite soon become a GC delegate or EC member if there is a vacancy. Branches can also meet separately to their own timetable too. The four officers the branch has to elect each year are:

• Chair
• Vice-Chair
• Secretary
• Women’s Officer

At least two of these post-holders must be women. Whilst allowed for under Party Rules, Branches in our CLP do not locally elect a Treasurer as branches do not hold funds in our CLP.

The Branch may also appoint additional functional officers similar to the ones listed above in the CLP list to help their Branch develop and function if they wish. Branch Officer Roles are below:

Branch Chair

The chair is the senior officer of the branch:

• Chairing of Branch meetings.
• Keeping the meeting to time and ensure business is conducted.
• Draws up the meeting agenda along with the Branch Secretary.
• Ensuring inclusivity of members in activities and meetings.
• Play a neutral role within the Branch during debates.
• Ensure motions and ballots are carried out in line with the rules.
• Chairs local shortlisting and selection meetings for choosing Council candidates.
• Sits on the CLP Executive Committee (EC) ex-officio to communicate concerns and provide feedback.

Branch Vice Chair

Covers for the Chair in their absence. Branches can if they wish develop the role so it is similar to the CLP Vice-Chair role perhaps covering campaign organising, leaflet delivery whilst leaving engaging with local members more to the Branch Secretary.

Branch Secretary

The Branch Secretary works with the Branch Chair to plan a whole year of activity in your local area, making sure that your branch is doing as much campaigning as possible. You will head up the member communications strategy in your branch and work with the Chair to make meetings fair, interesting and inclusive. What are your key tasks?

• Convenes branch meetings ensuring that all members receive at least seven days notice.
• Works with the Chair to draws up the agenda for meetings.
• Takes minutes of the meeting
• Monitors the quoracy of meetings to ensure they are constitutionally valid.
• Sits on the CLP Executive Committee (EC) ex-officio to communicate concerns and provide feedback.
• Reports any membership issues such as deaths, moves and change of contact details
• Work with the CLP Vice Chair Campaigns and Membership to engage with new members.
• Develop a strong and consistent communication strategy, making sure that all your members are well informed on party activity.
• Manages motions including ensuring they go out with the notice to members, they are sent to the CLP Secretary for presentation by the General Committee (GC)
• Manages the election of delegates, ensuring gender quota and ensures in-year vacancies are filled.
• Co-ordinates the Branch AGM and nominations process.
• Alongside the LCF/CLP manages the shortlisting and selection meetings for Council candidates.

Branch Women’s Officer

Represents women members and ensures the local party engages with women voters. They can work together with the CLP Women’s Officer and other branch Women’s Officer as a team on broader CLP wide events and issues.

Branch Delegates to the CLP General Committee (GC)

The Branch elects a GC delegation and the guidance on this is as follows:

• The Chair & Secretary are ex-officio members of the branch GC delegation
• Every branch is allowed 1 delegate per 10 members or part thereof
• This delegation size is fixed based on the membership at the end of the year.
• GC delegates including ex-officio members must be at least 50% female rounded down if an odd total number.
• The branch can also send an additional Youth Delegate (Under 27) who is not subject to the branch gender quota.
• The role of delegates is to raise questions on behalf of their branch, report back to their branch what took place at GC and to present motions passed from the branch
• A member cannot stand for a position on the CLP Executive unless they are a delegate to the GC for a branch trade union or Co-op Party.