The campaign for a living wage is now supported by the TUC and the Labour Party, plus many universities, some local authorities, and some businesses and charitable organisations. It is long overdue, says ERNIE JACQUES, but to have a real impact a living wage must be compulsory....
The Living Wage: A policy with history
Ed Miliband’s much-publicised support for a living wage puts him at odds with a previous Labour leader – Ramsay MacDonald. IAN BULLOCK explains....
Communications and other Big Issues
The Raymond Williams Foundation is holding a ‘Communications’ residential weekend seminar at the Adelphi Hotel in Liverpool on 23-25 November....
The Challenge of a Generation
Growing poverty and inequality in Europe prove that the market alone cannot deliver. It’s time to change the narrative, says JUDITH KIRTON-DARLING, Confederal Secretary of the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC). Here, she sets out the terms of a new European social contract. Austerity and poverty in Europe are blighting our continent. Both are having...
‘Reckless’ contractor still in running for UK police contracts
Ahead of the Police & Crime Commissioner elections, a negligence verdict in Oregon has intensified pressure to keep the tainted contractor KBR out of UK policing. CLARE SAMBROOK reports....
Meet the New Boss
The UK government has created a new profit source for security giant G4S and its partners: managing housing for asylum seekers. JOHN GRAYSON reports on a reckless experiment whose result is human misery. On the evening of Tuesday 30 October a new asylum seeker sent from London, 250 miles north to a property in Thornaby,...
100 Years of Cambridge Labour Party
Shadow foreign secretary Douglas Alexander MP will be the main speak at an event to celebrate the centenary of Cambridge Labour Party on Saturday 17 November....
A Remarkable History
BARRY WINTER reviews a new history of Namibia, where the struggle for social justice continues....
An appeal from the Marikana Support Campaign
On the 16 August, South African Police fired live ammunition at striking miners at Lonmin’s Marikana mine, killing 34 and injuring 78. Many were shot at close range while trying to surrender. The Marikana miners were demanding a tripling of their salary to R12,500 (£950 or €1100) per month. In the following days, 270 of...
‘Plebs’ on the march
The self-declared ‘plebs’ were out in force on Saturday at the TUC’s march against austerity in London, while thousands more were on the streets of Glasgow and Belfast to voice their anger at the coalition government. ‘Plebs Unite’ read one placard. ‘Proud Loud Educated Broke’ said another. ‘I’d rather be a pleb than a toff’...
A Labour Movement Alternative
As the Scottish independence debate heats up, PAULINE BRYAN argues that the status quo, devo max, devo plus and the SNP version of independence are each built on a neo-liberal model of economics. In their own ways, she says, they prevent even a classical social democratic approach to fiscal policy and the stimulation of economic...
Co-op weekend to focus on next generation
The new Co-operative Party general secretary, Karin Christiansen, will be guest speaker at the party’s north of England and Scotland weekend school at the end of November....