Your Party, the leftwing movement steered by Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana, has set out draft constitution plans including a leadership contest in the new year and new governing structures, the Guardian has learned.
Organisers say the proposals will bring a “democratic revolution” and begin transforming Britain’s “post-Labour left” into a formal political force, while drawing a line under months of public rifts.
According to plans, the group intends to elect a leader or co-leaders by March 2026 through a one-member one-vote system and create a 21-member central executive committee (CEC) dominated by ordinary members.
Sixteen seats would be directly elected by members, with two reserved for MPs, who would be barred from chairing. The leader’s term would be capped at 21 months, keeping the founding team in place until late 2027, unless members decide otherwise.
The CEC, chair and vice-chair model is billed as a central pillar of Your Party’s attempt to build a political organisation “accountable not to billionaires and their client politicians, but to ordinary people”, breaking decisively with what organisers call the top-down Westminster model.
If endorsed at a founding conference in Liverpool on 29-30 November, the blueprint would turn a loose and often fractious alliance into Britain’s first major party to the left of Labour in a generation, giving it formal rules, internal elections and a permanent structure.
Your Party is expected to confirm its official name within weeks, with members due to vote on it before the conference, it is understood. Those involved emphasise that Corbyn and Sultana are steering the public process but will have no guaranteed leadership role once members vote next year.
There is already speculation about whether Corbyn will stand, with some allies urging him to consider the risks of running given he has at times been privately frustrated by Sultana’s unilateral decisions.
Others, meanwhile, have encouraged Sultana to run on her own ticket, given her questions over whether she thinks the party is democratic enough, her accusations of a “sexist boys’ club” and two self-directed interventions.
The document introduces a digital democracy process, encouraging individual members to submit edits and suggestions online, with the text evolving “iteratively” over several weeks. Thousands of delegates will then be chosen by sortition (lottery) to vote on amendments at the Liverpool conference before the final version goes to an all-member vote.
Insiders said the draft would include recall clauses, allowing elected officers to be removed midterm if they lost the confidence of members, part of wider safeguards intended to prevent any leadership drift. They also confirmed that the constitution would contain strict procedures to guarantee that selection processes remained democratic and that “due diligence” could not be misused, a clear response to criticisms of candidate vetting under Labour’s current leadership.
The CEC would approve candidates approval and the party’s finances, powers that, some warn, could eclipse the elected leadership itself.
Supporters counter that those responsibilities are necessary to prevent MPs consolidating control and point to new oversight clauses designed to ensure accountability. Sympathetic organisers concede a tension remains between Sultana’s democratic idealism and the administrative realities of party-building.
The draft comes after months of turmoil. Some said Sultana’s premature announcement in July was intended to prod Corbyn into engaging more decisively, reflecting frustration among younger organisers at his hesitation to formalise their joint work.
Last month, Sultana and her allies promoted a membership email drive that went live without full signoff, prompting internal complaints over data handling. The MP then accused colleagues in the Independent Alliance of running a “sexist boys’ club”, saying she launched the portal to protect grassroots engagement after being sidelined. Corbyn’s team denounced the site and referred the issue to the Information Commissioner’s Office.
More than 20,000 people registered within hours.
Both Corbyn and Sultana later said the dispute had been resolved, with Sultana joking that the pair were like the Gallagher brothers, and one ally saying that, like the brothers, “one’s all heart, one’s all stubbornness”. Debate among supporters has since shifted to how the drafting group was selected and whether its internal workings would ever be made public.
Organisers argue that disagreements are inevitable in a democratic project. Asked whether the constitution should include a binding clause to prevent future public rows, one insider said: “We don’t think democratic parties can or should do that. There will be vigorous debate at assemblies, but it should be kept respectful.”
Regional assemblies begin this week, with more than 20 events planned nationwide before the conference. No independent body has yet been appointed to oversee the leadership vote planned for March 2026, though insiders say the ballot will be run by a trusted independent professional body to ensure transparency.
