Labour appears to have started a purge against those members in Scotland who supported the SNP in the recent general election. Clearly the party has every right to sling out those members who support other parties, but on so many levels this amounts to bad politics.
First of all, Labour cannot afford to lose any members at all, given that its membership is now less than 10,000 in Scotland. Actually it is probably considerably less than that, but since the party refuses to publicise its official membership figures, the round figure of 10,000 will do for today.
Secondly, why was this letter sent out by the national party in London, and only copied to the local party in Scotland? If Scottish Labour really is an autonomous entity then surely they should have handled this matter? It looks from this as if London handles everything, even to the extent of slinging out rank and file members. If they do that, how can Scottish Labour even claim to have the remotest degree of autonomy from the central party?
Thirdly, what's with the "Scottish Nationalist Party" bit of the letter. Perish the thought that London Labour wants to get in a final dig at the party that just left them with their arses hanging out the window on the 7th May 2015, but that's how it looks.
Finally, just how many other members of this fast diminishing party have also received these letters? We know of this one, but the suspicion must be that others were sent out as well, given the level of support that the SNP received from most of the Scottish left.
All in all this strikes me as nothing more than a desperate attempt to scare what is left of the Labour Party in Scotland back into line. It it unlikely to succeed, as a more plausible outcome would be mass abandonments of the sinking ship, but desperate times call for desperate measures.
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