VINCE MILLS marks the 90th anniversary of the Independent Labour Party’s disaffiliation from the Labour Party in July 1932 by calling for the current Labour left to stick with the party and not add to the long list of failed attempts to build a socialist alternative....
CHRIS OLEWICZ calls for a revival of the consumer co-operatives that once formed a vital pillar of the Labour movement and could play a crucial role in our crisis-riddled times....
WILL BROWN reflects on a recent Compass paper on electoral reform, the union and devolution, that calls for Labour to be far more radical on constitutional reform than the current debates over proportional representation. ...
MARY STRATFORD celebrates the return of Durham Miners’ Gala, explaining how it’s survived for more than 150 years and why it still matters to local people and the wider Labour movement. ‘It remains the greatest celebration of trade union and Labour movement values in the UK … and beyond.’...
The Social-Democratic Federation had various names and endured many splits during its existence, but at its best it embodied the crucial and often neglected link between socialism and democracy. PAUL MAYNE reviews a new book on one of Labour’s founding organisations....
PAUL SALVESON hails the work of a north-west ILPer and intrepid co-operator whose life and achievements are finally due to be commemorated nearly a century after her death....
CHRISTOPHER OLEWICZ celebrates the arrival of a new addition to the co-operative movement, one based on the same vision and principles as the 19th pioneers. A ‘new Rochdale’ is within our grasp, he says. ...
When Tony Blair’s New Labour government was elected on 1 May 1997, exactly 25 years ago last Sunday, it brought to an end 18 years of Conservative rule....
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....
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?...
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’....