In a period awash with party election manifestoes, the left magazine and campaign group, Chartist, has unveiled its own manifesto for “a properly democratic socialist alternative to austerity”. Chartist’s 2015 manifesto is a revised version of one published by its editorial board in 2007 – “the year before financial capitalism fell in on itself”. “Capitalism...
Condition Critical
The Socialist Health Association has highlighted five ways the government’s health reforms have failed to improve patient care, the criteria used by former health secretary Andrew Lansley to defend his policies against a damning King’s Fund report last month. The King’s Fund health think tank described Lansley’s reforms as “damaging and distracting” for introducing even...
Housing and the Class Struggle
Housing, home ownership and the right to an affordable home are set to be big issues at this year’s general election, and they will be the focus of discussion at the next Wakefield Socialist History Group meeting this Saturday, 28 February....
Class Set Out What’s at Stake at Election 2015
The Centre for Labour and Social Studies has published a new election guide on the issues of work, pay and unions as part of a series of pamphlets highlighting what’s at stake in the parties’ policies for working people....
The Co-op Party Launches its Agenda for Britain
The Co-operative Party launched its election manifesto last week, the culmination of two years work setting out plans for “an economy and society that puts people first, in which the rewards of economic success are shared by all”. ‘A Co-operative Agenda for Britain’ sets out the party’s agenda on a number of areas, including energy,...
Miliband Promises New Rights to Co-op Ownership
Labour leader Ed Miliband committed to “put co-operative values at the heart of Labour’s platform for government” on Friday (6 February), saying that if Labour wins the general election workers will have the right to buy out the firm they work for when it comes up for sale or is threatened with closure. Writing in...
Commit to Publicly-Owned Services, Labour Told
The We Own It campaign is lobbying for the Labour Party to include a Public Services Users’ Bill in its election manifesto, and calling for all supporters of publicly-owned services to put pressure on Labour’s shadow minister for procurement, Jon Trickett....
Join the March for Homes
Thousands of Londoners will march on City Hall next Saturday (31 January) to demand an end to the housing crisis which is blighting the lives of many of the poorest people living in the capital....
GMB Welcomes Labour’s Election Pledges
The GMB union has welcomed the Labour Party’s election pledges to put working people and trade unionists at the centre of the 2015 general election....
The Case for Democratic Devolution
In recent decades our society has become seriously and, indeed, dangerously unbalanced in a series of crucial, yet interlinked, ways. BARRY WINTER argues that regional devolution could play an important part in re-democratising and re-balancing society. Unbalanced Britain is being subjected to growing poverty and widening social inequalities generally; to increasing and irresponsible financial and...
Labour Should Outlaw Zero-Hours Contracts
Labour’s opposition to zero hour contracts is important and welcome, says ERNIE JACQUES. But the Party’s approach is still far too timid. In his speech at Senate House last month, Labour leader Ed Miliband could not have been stronger in his attack on the coalition government’s ‘zero-zero economy’ and the horrific Victorian employment practices exemplified...
Labour’s Plan for Government
The Labour Party has published its plan for government setting out its commitments in four areas: economy, society, politics and Britain in the world....