Publications

The ILP: Past & Present, Parts 1&2 – Special Offer

The ILP’s history pamphlets – Past & Present Parts 1 and 2 – can now be ordered together for the reduced price of £14.00 including postage. Available individually for £8.00 each (see below) you can now save money and follow the ILP’s story from its birth in 1893 to the present day by buying both publications together.

The pamphlets, written by Barry Winter and William Brown, are printed in full colour with many original images from the ILP’s archives, while there is also a comprehensive and up-to-date guide to further reading on the ILP and its place in socialist history.

Published 2023.
£14.00 including p&p.





The ILP: Past & Present, Part 2

The ILP: Past & Present, Part 2 by Barry Winter and William Brown brings the ILP’s story right up to date, covering the post-war period when it struggled to survive and retain political relevance; to 1975 when it made a bold and principled decision to return to the Labour Party as Independent Labour Publications.

It goes on to chart the turbulent Thatcher years when the ILP developed a distinctive approach to Labour and political change that was often at odds with much of the rest of the left.

It also includes a whole new section that traces the last 30 years, a period when the ILP has continued to provide an independent left voice within and outside the party – whether under new Labour, Ed Miliband, Jeremy Corbyn or Keir Starmer.

Part 1, published in June 2023 (see below), takes the the ILP’s story from its birth in the last decades of the 19th century to 1945.

Published 2023.
£8.00 including p&p.




 

The ILP: Past & Present, Part 1

The ILP: Past & Present, Part 1 by Barry Winter is published to mark the 130th anniversary of the organisation’s founding in January 1893. It is a revised and updated version of the first edition of The ILP: Past & Present, also written by Barry and published 30 years ago to coincide with our centenary celebrations.

Like its predecessor, the 2023 version describes the role played by different generations of ILPers in endeavouring to create a humanitarian, socially just society for all. It reviews the changing circumstances that they confronted while tracing the ILP’s ever-changing relationships with other political organisations, not least the Labour Party.

Unlike its predecessor, it is published in two parts. This pamphlet covers the first half of the ILP’s story, from its formation in the last decades of the 19th century, through its development in the early decades of the 20th, to 1945 when it found itself isolated from mainstream politics and a dwindling force on the left. Part 2, to be published later in 2023, will chart the post-war years.

Published 2023.
£8.00 including p&p.

 

  • Ada Salter and the Origins of Ethical Socialism

    Ada Salter and the Origins of Ethical Socialism by Graham Taylor is 28-page A5 pamphlet that explores the origins of the early ILP’s ethical socialism and argues that the ideas behind its hard-headed moral and political framework can serve as an inspiration for the left today.

    It draws on Taylor’s much-praised biography of Salter, who pioneered the transformational Bermondsey Revolution in south east London in the early years of the 20th century, explores the history of the ideas that inspired her, and looks at what happened to those political ideals in the second half of the 20th century.

    Published 2017.
    £4.00 including p&p.

  • They Did Not Pass

    They Did Not Pass: 300,000 Workers Say NO to Mosley is a contemporary ILP account of the Battle of Cable Street on 4 October 1936 when the people of the east end of London united to halt Oswald Mosley and his British Union of Fascists (BUF) from marching through Stepney. The ILP was one of the organisations that helped to organise the resistance and this pamphlet was published soon afterwards.

    Originally sold for one old penny and sub-titled ‘A Souvenir of the East End Workers’ Victory over Fascism’, we are pleased to make it available free to mark the 80th anniversary of the Cable Street events.

    Click here to download as a pdf document.

  • Unbalanced Britain: Housing in Crisis

    Unbalanced Britain: Housing in Crisis, by Quintin Bradley, Simon Jose, Ellen Robottom and Barry Winter, is a 20-page A5 pamphlet that brings together contributions from three of the main speakers at the ILP’s Unbalanced Britain seminar on the housing crisis held in Leeds in March 2016.

    A report of that conference is available here where you can also find links to earlier versions of these articles. This pamphlet also includes a new introduction by Barry Winter and an account of earlier housing struggles in which the ILP and ILPers played a significant role.

    Together, these five pieces amount to a compelling call for politicians to address the defining issue of our time.

    Published 2016.
    £4.00 including p&p.

  • ILP Lapel Badges

    ILP enamel lapel badge
    Featuring the unique ‘S’ logo used by the Independent Labour Party in the early years of the 20th century.
    Red and gold design.
    2cm in diameter.

    £4.00 including p&p.

  • Homage to Tom Maguire

    Homage to Tom Maguire by EP Thompson is a 40-page, A5 pamphlet about the Leeds ILPer, poet, propagandist and photographer Tom Maguire, a radical organiser who played a vital role in the Leeds gas strike of 1890 but died in poverty five years later at the tragically young age of 29.

    Originally published in 1960 in a memorial book of essays to the socialist scholar GDH Cole, it is re-published in pamphlet form in memory of two more recent Leeds ILPers, Walt and Annie Mallorie.
    Click here for more information.

    Published 2016.
    £5.00 including p&p.

  • John McNair’s Spanish Diary

    John McNair’s Spanish Diary is a first-hand account of the Spanish Civil War written by a lifelong ILPer who later became the organisation’s general secretary. This pamphlet contains a brief account of McNair’s life followed by his own contemporary, first-hand reporting of events in Spain in 1936. Almost eight decades later, it remains a compelling read and a testament to the author’s reputation as a born storyteller.

    Originally sold for 40p, we are pleased to be able to make it available free.

    Click here to download as a pdf document.

  • Unbalanced Britain

    Unbalanced Britain: Corporate Power and our Me-based Culture, by Barry Winter, is an eight-page A4 pamphlet based on Barry’s introductory talk at the ILP’s first ‘Unbalanced Britain’ workshop at the Circle centre in Sheffield on 28 June 2014.

    Updated in 2015, it provides useful background reading for the ILP’s series of Unbalanced Britain meetings which will resume in 2016.

    Available here to download for free in pdf format.

  • ILP Postcards

    Postcards from the ILP’s ‘Coming of Age’ conference and celebration in Bradford on 11 April 1914, 11 years after the organisation was founded in the same city. The illustration declares socialism as ‘the hope of the world’ and is signed by Chairman J Keir Hardie and Secretary Francis Johnson.

    First issued 2015.
    Pack of three: £2.50.

  • Land and Freedom – 2013 edition

    Land and Freedom is an expanded edition of the ILP’s short but moving account of the Spanish Civil War, using the often-silenced voices of Spanish activists. Focusing on events in Catalonia, it shows how even today, there is much more to be remembered than the courage of members of the International Brigade.

    The pamphlet now includes a brief and poignant profile of the ILP volunteer Stafford Cottman.

    Published 2013.
    Price £4.00.

  • ILP Calendar 2013

    An A4 wall calendar to mark the ILP’s 120th anniversary featuring political cartoons from the 1890s and 1920s. Each month is illustrated by socialist cartoons first published in Keir Hardie’s newspaper, Labour Leader, or its ILP successor, New Leader. They are not only a poignant reminder of our past but retain significant political relevance today.

    Price £6.00, including p&p (reduced from £9.00).

  • The ILP: Past and Present

    ILP_p&pA lively, frank and well-illustrated account of the ILP’s history from its grass-roots origins in the 1890s to the present day; it provides a commentary on the Labour party’s development, including the rise and fall of the Labour left.

    Price £3.50

    This publication is now sold out.

  • A Socialism for Our Times: The ILP Perspective

    Socialism for our Times

    In spite of the claims regularly made that capitalism is triumphant, that it is our fate, and that there is no alternative, we seek to demonstrate that we can build a credible socialism for our times.

    Published in 2003.

    Price £2.50