There’s a ‘for sale’ outside Labour’s former headquarters at 150 Walworth Road in south London.

There are few clues to the political intrigues and dramas that took place behind the sandstone Georgian facade in the 1980s and early 90s. No plaques above the window from where militants Derek Hatton and Tony Mulhearn waved to supporters as the leadership ordained their expulsion, or above the door to the Labour party bookshop where Tony Benn came into the building (on the extreme left, of course). No echoes of Neil Kinnock’s dignified speech in the early hours of 10th April 1992 conceding defeat, as Tories drove up and down outside chanting ‘four-nil’, or any trace of the floral tributes left by hundreds of Londoners on the day John Smith died.

It’s hard to believe it now, but monthly National Executive Committee (NEC) meetings were occasions of high drama. Often there would be demonstrations and lobbies outside, television cameras and items on the news. Labour’s modernisation – the recantation of nationalisation and unilateralism, the expulsion of the Trotskyists, the painstaking reconnection with the electorate – was enacted at NEC meetings. In opposition, the Labour NEC becomes a central part of the party’s life. In government, it is cabinet that counts, and its various sub-committees such as the DA committee (domestic policy), the L committee (legislation) or the national economic council (dealing with the recession), because in government Labour does. In opposition Labour talks. So papers discussed at the NEC, votes taken at the NEC, and elections to the NEC become the substitute for action. Rising stars can make their name; leaders must stamp down their authority.

In the 1970s Tony Benn and his supporters used the NEC and its sub-committees to capture the machinery of the party. The progress of Bennites in the early 70s, such as Margaret Jackson (now Beckett) is described in Michael Hatfield’s The House the Left Built. It shows how a dedicated band, through stamina and co-ordination, can seize the levers of party in the Labour party. The leadership of the party – Wilson and Callaghan – conceded the ground, by failing to engage, by ignoring the NEC, or simply by not turning up.

I don’t know whether Labour will win a majority at the next election. There are only four broad possible outcomes: Labour win, Tory win, coalition with Labour, or coalition without Labour. The Guardian ICM poll earlier in the week puts Labour on 29 points compared to the Tories’ 42 points, which might suggest a Cameron majority of 70 seats. But opinion polls are not general elections. Polls get it wrong sometimes. Perhaps Labour will win, and the NEC will remain in relative obscurity?

But if Labour loses, the national executive will assume its traditional saliency. That means the people elected to the NEC now will be the ones steering the party through the first months in opposition, including the leadership elections and setting out the organisational strategy for the party. It raises the question: what should it do and who should be on it?

The last thing we need is an NEC which becomes the platform for a left-right battle for the soul of the party. Sectarians need not apply. We need people who put Labour first, who are concerned with the party’s membership recruitment, financial base, and local campaigning. We need people with a track record of local activism, not national grandstanding. We need people willing to do painstaking behind-the-scenes work alongside the party’s heroic head office staff. The NEC must not become a mini-conference, with resolutions, speeches and briefings to the Guardian. It must keep the party’s organisation on an even keel if there are darker days ahead. The first few months will set the tone for the following years.

For these reasons I am backing Luke Akehurst in his bid to be elected onto the NEC. Luke is a Labour councillor and former parliamentary candidate. He spoke movingly at the party conference in Brighton this year about his experiences as a patient of the NHS. He also writes a political blog. I share many (but not all) of his political views, and I have known him for nearly 20 years, but this not why he gets my vote. He gets my vote because he is as Labour as you can get. Through thick and thin, he has campaigned for Labour.

He cares deeply about the future of our party and what it can do for our country. Long after the camp followers and fair-weather friends have deserted us, when the special advisers have melted back into the voluntary sector, lobby shops or academia, when the political commentators have wrestled with their consciences and backed Cameron, there will still be people such as Luke Akehurst keeping the guttering flame of Labour alive.

So when those NEC ballot papers arrive on your doorstep, please vote Labour.

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