Right of Reply: A Labour Party activist responds to Ken Livingstone's article about the NEC elections

KEN LIVINGSTONE'S article on Labour's national executive elections in Wednesday's Independent was as gossipy and readable as ever, though the Millbank Tendency jokes are getting a little stale.

But my problem, as someone standing for the NEC this year, is that I just did not recognise myself or these elections in Ken Livingstone's article.

I wasn't aware they were about confounding the spin-doctors, or a re- run of his battle with Peter Mandelson. I thought they were about giving grassroots members a voice in our party. That's what the constituency section is meant to be - not for Ken Livingstone or Peter Mandelson.

I am not a spin-doctor, I don't know Derek Draper or any of the other people he mentioned and I'm sure Ken has been to Millbank more times than me. What I am is a 41-year-old ordinary party member who is on the polity forum. I'm the first Afro-Caribbean councillor in Ealing and, by the way, the only black candidate standing for the NEC.

My constituency, which has the biggest membership in the country, has healthy, diverse views. I believe the role of a constituency member on the NEC is to represent those views.

I hope I have got a critical mind. Ken doesn't know me well enough to make a judgement. I don't intend to be controlled by anyone. I resent the suggestion that I am.

I've certainly no intention of giving Tony Blair a blank cheque. Nor are Rita Stringfellow, Michael Cashman, Terry Thomas, Sylvia Tudhope and Diana Jeuda, who are also standing. But we do want this Government to be a success. After all, along with all the other members, we worked hard to get them elected. We won't be afraid to criticise or flinch from forcefully putting the views of the ordinary member. But, unlike Ken, we'll try to do it in a constructive way.