Oxford University Labour Club
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Oxford University Labour Club (OULC) was founded in the early part of the 20th century to provide a voice for Labour Party values and for socialism at Oxford University, England.
OULC holds regular speaker events, social events, policy discussion and takes part in year-round campaigning activity, in the student movement, for the Labour Party and on issues decided by the membership. In recent years, the club hosted high-profile figures from the Labour movement including Tony Benn, Peter Hain, Des Browne, Derek Simpson (General Secretary of Amicus), and author John O'Farrell. It also produces a weekly newsletter, Look Left
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[edit] Constitution and organisation
OULC is run by an elected executive committee. The current Co-Chairs are Georgia Gould and Thom Greenwood.
OULC also holds General Meetings and Termly General Meetings at which its members can pass policy in the form of motions.
[edit] Notable former members of the executive committee
- Tony Benn, MP, former cabinet minister
- Richard Crossman, MP, former cabinet minister, diarist
- Tony Crosland, MP, former cabinet minister
- Chris Huhne, MP, former Liberal Democrats leadership candidate
- Roy Jenkins, MP, Chancellor of the Exchequer, President of the European Commission, co-founder of Social Democratic Party
- Peter Mandelson, MP, former cabinet minister, EU commissioner, spin doctor
- David Miliband, MP, cabinet minister
- Iris Murdoch, writer
- Rupert Murdoch, media tycoon
- Andrew Smith, MP, former cabinet minister
[edit] Involvement in Labour politics
[edit] Labour students
OULC is affiliated to, and has strong relations with, Labour Students, and former OULC chairs have held a number of prominent positions. Labour Students was nationally chaired in 2002/3 by Ellie Reeves and in 2003/4 by Karim Palant. In 2004/5 Oliver Kempton was elected as Campaigns & Membership Officer, and currently former OULC chair Steve Longden is Campaigns & Membership Officer.
[edit] Other
OULC also has links with other socialist organisations, trade unions, and Labour Party groups, including the Oxford District and Reading Labour Parties. OULC has campaigned in Reading in the past, and the current Chair of Oxford East Constituency Labour Party is a former OULC member, Oscar Van Nooijen.
[edit] Broader political involvement
[edit] Oxford University Student Union
Since the establishment of the Oxford University Student Union in the early 1970s, OULC has maintained a strong presence. There have been many Labour presidents, starting with John Grogan in the early 1980s, and OULC candidates have in recent years been successful in the 1997 (Katherine Rainwood), 1998 (Anneliese Dodds), 1999 (Kirsty McNeill), 2004 (Emma Norris), and 2005 (Alan Strickland) OUSU presidential elections. Strickland is the current President. OUSU's executive committee and delegate body has also had a consistently strong Labour presence.
[edit] National Union of Students
Stephen Twigg was National President of the National Union of Students and an OULC member in the early 1990s.
[edit] Local Government
Four former members of OULC currently sit on Oxford City Council.
[edit] Parliament
At the 2005 General Election, five recent former OULC members stood for election as Labour candidates.
In parliament former OULC members include John Grogan, Ed Balls, Ed and David Milliband
[edit] History
[edit] World War 2 splits
In the leadup to the Second World War, the OULC was part of a communist-dominated popular front organization in Oxford which campaigned for Britain to ally with the Soviet Union in an attempt to defeat Nazism. At this time a significant proportion of the University's undergraduate body were members of the club (nearly a third at its peak); however, the fact that communists were allowed full membership led to an increasing divergence between the OULC and the national Labour Party. This rift came to a head under the Chairship, in 1939, of Denis Healey[citation needed] .
The Molotov-Ribbentrop pact of 1939 caused a major club split, with the communists now being strongly against British involvement in a European war that would have seen Britain fighting the Soviet Union. Following a vote to reaffirm OULC's affiliation to the popular front movement in early 1940 which resulted in the Labour Party disaffiliating the OULC, Executive members including Tony Crosland and Roy Jenkins decided to leave OULC and form Oxford University Democratic Socialist Club (OUDSC)[citation needed].
The schism was extremely damaging to the OULC, which was quickly reduced to an increasingly extreme communist rump; within 12 months the OULC had fewer than 100 members. Its standing was furthar damaged when the national Labour Party chose to allow the OUDSC to affiliate to it — making the OUDSC the effective student Labour Party body in Oxford, ignoring the presence of OULC. The club's financial future was also in jepoardy, as new OUDSC Treasurer Roy Jenkins and OULC Treasurer Iris Murdoch engaged in an ongoing battle about which new organization should carry the debts and assets present prior to the split[citation needed].
As the war progressed, membership of both clubs changed, and the reasons for the split became more the stuff of history, OULC and OUDSC merged following a referendum of the members of both clubs in 1943. It is interesting to note that many of the key protagonists of both clubs went on to be colleagues in future Labour governments. It is also of interest that Roy Jenkins in particular demonstrated a willingness to depart from established party organizations when his position would be better represented by a new, more moderate organisation. This forshadowed the establishment of the Social Democratic Party over forty years later[citation needed].
