Jim McMahon MP was elected as the new Chair of the NEC.  Jim is the Labour and Co-operative MP for Oldham West & Royton, Shadow Secretary of State for Transport and Chair of the Co-operative Parliamentary Group.

Ruth Hall was elected as Vice Chair.  Ruth represents Scotland and Northern Ireland on the NEC.

Elections were also held for the NEC Sub-Committees: Audit, Policy, Staffing and Remuneration, Disputes, and the Rules Working Party.

The General Secretary reports to each NEC meeting on the Party’s work towards our strategic objectives since the last meeting.

35,000 individuals joined our call to action, led by Preet Gill MP in her role as Shadow Secretary of State DfID, to seek to persuade Nestle to continue to use Fairtrade cocoa in their ranges.

Owning the Future – our new economic policy platform was published over eight weeks, supported by zoom content from Co-operative Shadow Chancellor Anneliese Dodds, Wales First Minister, Mark Drakeford MS and Richard Leonard, Scottish Labour Leader.

We designed, launched and commissioned support and completed Liam Byrne’s West Midlands Co-operative Taskforce.

We undertook further work, including a ‘write to your MP’ campaign, on ‘Save DfiD.

Working with Co-op MP and Shadow DCMS Minister, Tracy Brabin and the wider co-op movement, the Party led a call for co-ops in the arts not to be excluded from DCMS funding. This work led to a reversal from the Government that meant that co-ops had access to this vital support.

The Party also launched a call to action on the availability of access to cash through the extended lockdown period.

The Party worked closely with member Subscribing Societies and our member, USDAW to lead the Labour and Co-operative movement’s opposition to the Westminster Governments attempt to change Sunday Trading regulations.

We gave a high profile to Co-operative Party representatives supporting Black Lives Matter, greater racial equality and the wider understanding of its effects on economic inequality. This has included contributions from Florence Eshalomi MP, Vaughan Gething MS, Shelter and Deputy Mayor of Bristol, Cllr. Asher Craig.

The Party continued to spearhead work seeking greater protections for Retail Workers in both Scottish Parliament and Westminster. This has included work in Westminster, petitions, video content and joint work with our member Societies, including the open letter signed by 23 major UK retailer CEO’s, and national TV and press coverage in support of Alex Norris MP’s Bill. This work was integrated with the Scottish Party’s work to promote support for Daniel Johnson MSP’s Private Members Bill, which led to the Bill being universally supported in the Scottish Parliament.

We have continued to work closely with our subscribing Societies on Food Justice.

The Party worked with the Midcounties Co-op Society to build an online tool to enable members and supporters to show support for Midcounties’ campaign to remove VAT from Sunscreen – this work resulted in hundreds of Party activists joining the campaign and led to Parliamentary action and it being raised with Treasury Ministers.

Since the beginning of the Covid 19 pandemic the Party has been involved in the policy and campaigning for the provision of Free School Meals, both publicly and privately with Ministers and their teams. Since the last report, the Party launched work around the provision of Free School Meals for pupils needing to isolate, promoted relevant work from our member Societies (leading to engagement from Marcus Rashford with Party content) and met with the Shadow Secretary of State for Education to co-ordinate future campaigning.

Working with our Societies, the Party developed and launched a Roadmap to Dignity in Bereavement. This was in addition to campaigning work raising the issue of the need to extend the Funeral grant fund. This work was led by Seema Malhotra MP, Shadow DWP spokesperson.

Throughout the period, the Party continued to organise regular and well-attended zoom event as well as a Summer School targeted at our large number of new members.

We also built on our WhatsApp groups, with nearly 1,000 members using the members’ group and hundreds in the councillors’ group.

The Party has worked with the Labour and Co-operative MP Jonathan Reynolds, Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions to promote the Co-op Party policy on the need for a new ‘Right to Own’ based on the Marcora Law in Italy.

15,000 copies of the Pioneer members’ magazine on the topic of ‘Owning the Future’ have been delivered to members and lapsed members.

The Party has published new guides on Party campaigns including ‘Love it List it’.

We have also continued to champion Fair Tax, both by promoting Co-op Movement leadership on this issue and by teaming up with relevant Labour Politicians and organisations to provide members and supporters with online content and educational sessions.

The Party has worked with both Luke Pollard MP (Shadow Secretary of State for DEFRA) and his team to promote the amendment to the Fisheries Bill to double the size of the co-operative sector within this industry.

The Co-operative Party took party in Labour Connected, with two well attended sessions on Food Justice and Protecting Community Assets. The Labour Party showed a ‘message from the Co-operative Party’ in the main programme ahead of the Labour General Secretary’s address, and the General Secretary spoke on economic justice alongside the Shadow Chancellor, General Secretary of FBU and Assistant General Secretary of UNITE the Union.

The Leader of the Labour Party provided online content congratulating the Party on the success in achieving our 100^th Local Authority to officially adopt our Charter on Modern Slavery, and called on other Local Authorities to join the Co-operative Party’s campaign.

The Party achieved higher than previous majorities at two subscribing Society AGMs in favour of continued support of the Party. This included the Co-op Group. We won praise from Presidents and Chief Executives at AGMs and in supporting documents.

In addition to regular informal contact and the weekly Co-ops UK organised calls, the Party has continued to keep Subscribing Society senior board members up to date with Party activity through the Subscribing Society meetings, the most recent of which was in September.

The Party successfully conducted the election of the new NEC working with CES.

In addition to the election for the NEC, the Party has sought to further strengthen the member led networks by facilitating the first democratic elections to their steering committees.

Membership has continued to increase, with over 200 new members per month in the last four months – the best recruitment period on record.  We have also recruited 19,000 new email supporters since Spring, a crucial stepping-stone to new members.

The Party continues to recognise those members who contribute to our voluntary clubs, with hand signed letters with to accompany the member magazine and our new policy publication ‘Owning the Future’.

The Party has engaged with the new General Secretary of the Labour Party to ensure that clear guidance has been issued to local Labour Parties reconstituting their LCF to LGCs to maintain the Co-operative Party’s place on them.

The Party has developed and launched a new ‘prospective councillor Candidate Programme’ and the first training session have begun.  Over  200 prospective new Councillors have joined the programme to date.

We have also held online hustings for two regional mayors for the West of England and Cambridgeshire and Peterborough.

Work is also in hand to select and support Labour and Co-operative candidates ahead of the Scottish and Welsh Parliament elections in 2021.

Total membership after arrears as of 31 August was 11,637 (2019: 10,454)
This reflects strong recruitment, lower arrears and resignations, and better retention compared to 2019.  Continuing this trend could lead us to finish 2020 with 12,000 members (a modern high).

Total recruitment from January to August was 1,401 (2019: 755)
Our recruitment strategy has delivered strong growth at double the 2019 rate. Five of our ten best months ever for recruitment have been since the General Election last December.

Total supporter list as of 31 August was 55,028 (2019: 39,911)
Converting supporters to members is our main recruitment source – this growth has been driven by strong campaign and policy output, and content linked to the General Election and Covid-19.

Membership income as of 31 August was £278,820 (2019: £256,299)
Income from members is up 8.8% or £22.5k from August 2019. 7.5% of members now pay above the standard rate (2019: 5.5%; 2018: 2.9%).

The NEC receives information on the Party’s income and expenditure to date and projected to the end of the year. The Party’s audited accounts for 2019 were presented to the Party’s AGM on 17 October and can be found in the Board Report and Accounts.

Over the summer, elections took place by one member one vote for the fist time to elect members to the steering committees of the each of the BAME, (Dis)Ability, LGBTQ+, and Women’s Networks.  The following people were elected:

BAME Co-operators Council

Ade Adeshina

Titus Ajayi

Martin Bailey

Shahina Jaffer

Faisal  Rana

Gregory Roberts

(dis)Ability Network Steering Committee

Cheryl  Barrott

Valerie Bossman-Quarshie

Jane Cameron

Ben Cooper

Mervyn Eastman

Jonathan Farr

Kavan Hawker

Miriam Ibberson

Duncan McGibbon

Theresa Vaughan

Joseph Watkinson

Sandra Wilson

LGBTQ+ Co-operators Representative Council

Vince Barry

Jane Cameron

David Griffiths

Ashley Halstead

Kira Lewis

Chris Penberthy

Stephen Stanners

Jamie Tennant

Chris Wills

Women’s Network Steering Committee.

Rosa Bolger

Nina Elliott

Lis Telcs

Joyce Welsh

Sandra Wilson

Each steering committee/council has places for up to 12 members, so nominations will re-open soon where there are vacancies.

Work can also now commence to establish a new Equalities Advisory Committee, which will include representatives from each of the steering committees.  The EAC will build links between the networks and with the NEC.

The BAME Co-operators Council met for the first time after the NEC AGM and elected Faisal Rana as the new BAME observer to the NEC.

The NEC will continue to meet on-line for the foreseeable future.  This will enable meetings that are shorter but more frequent than previously.  Two meetings are planned to replace the scheduled Strategy Weekend in November and between them, these meetings will cover the key priorities and budget for 2021 and other scheduled business.