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’....
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....