After a week of parliamentary rebellion and government chaos, ERNIE JACQUES assesses the outcome and impact of Labour’s ‘crazy’ welfare proposals. ‘For many, work is a means to an end. It can be, in varying degrees, tedious, unfulfilling and unrewarding. Try telling someone on zero-hours and minimum-wage contracts that work is uplifting and rewarding.‘...
Sick of waiting for free markets and trickle-down economics to make us all better off, ERNIE JACQUES looks for hope in the legacy of a northern factory owner and philanthropist whose social reforms inspired the welfare state. ...
CHRIS WILSON takes issue with Chancellor Rachel Reeves’s claim that there is no alternative to benefit cuts. A tax on wealth is not only possible, he says, but widely supported....
Compass and the Co-operative Party have both launched new initiatives in recent weeks aimed at understanding and tackling the rise of the far right....
The prime minister’s decision to cut international development aid to pay for increased defence spending is not only short sighted, says WILLIAM BROWN, it trashes the party’s proud record....
MARY STRATFORD is baffled and angry at the increasingly worrying course being charted by our Labour government. We need a rethink, she says, before things become truly terrifying....
Labour’s net zero election promise was one of the boldest aspects of its manifesto. Eight months in, MJ DENISON takes stock of the government’s difficult dilemmas and warns against a rushed transition to clean power....
The election of a new Labour government raises hopes that the scales between labour and capital will begin to be re-balanced. JOHN CUNNISON assesses the evidence so far....
The new Labour government has already made some progress in reforming the health system but there is much more to do, says KEITH VENABLES....
The government’s Bill to remove hereditary peers from the House of Lords is a welcome start on constitutional change, says CHRIS WILSON. But much more is needed for the UK to be a truly modern democracy....
How would society change if no-one needed to work to stay alive? That was the question Edward Carpenter set out to answer almost 130 years ago in an essay titled ‘Transitions to Freedom’. Would it hail a new collectivist phase? And would that then lead to full individual and social liberty?...
Various Labour leaders have been and gone since she first joined the party more than 40 years ago, but come election time MARY HULL has always been an enthusiastic, door-knocking campaigner. This time is different. Here she explains why the Starmer leadership has tested her loyalty to the limit....