The Housing Crisis and the Struggle for Affordable Homes

The government’s housing policies are aimed directly at people with the fewest resources and the lowest resistance, says ELLEN ROBOTTOM – which means community campaigns such as hers are more vital than ever. In his discussion of the Housing and Planning Bill, Dr Quintin Bradley explored an increasingly familiar characteristic of ‘welfare’ policy: namely, that...

Halting the Unions’ Decline

Trade unions are in a spot of bother, according to SHEILA BANKS. And Labour is partly to blame. The party needs a new way of connecting to union members that taps directly into their workplace experience. Throughout my working life, I have been an active trade unionist and representative, so I want to look at...

The Housing Crisis Weaponised

The government does not intend to solve our housing crisis, says QUINTIN BRADLEY. Instead it is using it as a weapon of policy against the beliefs and attitudes that sustain the welfare state....

Assessing the Blair Supremacy

BARRY WINTER considers the culture, impact and legacy of Tony Blair’s leadership of the Labour Party, greatly aided by Lewis Minkin’s The Blair Supremacy, published to great acclaim two years ago. In his dual role as academic and political insider, Lewis Minkin has produced three monumental books on the Labour Party. Each is a substantial...

Ada Salter: Pioneer of Ethical Socialism

Graham Taylor’s fine biography of Ada Salter provides a vivid account of the ILP’s ethical socialism as she lived it, says BARRY WINTER. Ada Salter’s hands-on approach to making the world a better place is told with clarity and passion in Graham Taylor’s new biography of the pioneering ILPer. Moreover, Ada’s busy life is explored...

A Bridge Over Troubled Water?

Labour’s disunity has been much in evidence recently. ALEX SOBEL argues that Open Labour can act as a bridge for those in the party who want to build an anti-Tory alliance based on an inclusive and empowering politics. At present, our party doesn’t look like a united party to those looking in from the outside....

Unbalanced Britain: Housing in Crisis

The Tory Housing Bill and Britain's housing crisis will be the subject of the ILP’s next Unbalanced Britain meeting in Leeds on Saturday 5 March with Dr Quintin Bradley, Fabian Hamilton MP and Ellen Robottom from Hands off our Homes....