CHRISTOPHER OLEWICZ examines an inside account of Preston Council’s much-hailed ‘model’ for local development, and casts his mind back to the 1980s when his own local authority tried to resist the march of Thatcherism with bottom-up regeneration and municipal enterprise....
Principle 5, the Sheffield-based co-operative resource centre, has published the latest in its series of re-discovered pamphlets from the history of the co-operative movement, called The Future of Co-operation, written originally in 1927 by Alice Honora Enfield....
CHRISTOPHER OLEWICZ looks back 90 years at Fenner Brockway’s ground-breaking report on destitution in 1930s Britain. With the current cost of living crisis, he asks, is ‘literal starvation’ once again stalking the nation’s poorest communities?...
Organisers of the Salter Centenary Project have launched a new website to highlight the year-long series of events celebrating ILPers Ada and Alfred Salter in south-east London throughout 2022....
It’s no secret that support for proportional representation has been growing within the Labour Party, not least on the Labour left. JACQUELINE TAYLOR puts the socialist case for a proportional voting system for UK general elections and addresses some of the common arguments against it....
Open Labour has converted its emergency motion in solidarity with the people of Ukraine, passed at its AGM on Sunday 13 March, into a model motion for local Labour Parties to agree at constituency meetings....
Charles Ammon had a habit of getting sacked for speaking his mind. But he rose from lowly telegraph boy to Labour Chief Whip and the House of Lords. GRAHAM TAYLOR traces the life of a founding ILPer and lifelong socialist who provided support and friendship to the Salters in Southwark....
The Russian invasion of Ukraine is against international law and a flagrant breach of the UN Charter. In deliberately targeting the civilian population the Russian leadership is committing crimes against humanity....
Unite Community has been at the heart of campaigns against Tory cuts to Universal Credit. HEATHER BLAKEY and GERRY LAVERY report on the ongoing battle for a new ‘common sense’....
BEN SALTONSTALL reviews a new book on the failings of the left that asks the right questions but falls for the all-too-easy answers of right-wing populism. ‘The book has the potential to tell the left things it needs to hear and understand. Unfortunately, it fails to do so.’...
The importance of religious beliefs to Keir Hardie’s political convictions is well known. But most Labour historians have underplayed the influence of radical Christianity on his world view, says NEIL JOHNSON....
The ILP was a major driver of opposition to the First World War in many parts of the country. The south London borough of Southwark was no different, as new research by JOHN TAYLOR has revealed....