The left must call out the fact that BlackRock and private billionaires have merged with the state apparatus as our leaders abandon any pretence of there being a ‘free market’ for direct and overt corporate control, writes JOE GILL
Britain’s communist guerilla who launched the WWII ‘Dad’s Army’
A crucial part of the war effort, the Home Guard, was launched partly due to the influence of Tom Wintringham, a revolutionary communist with a passion for DIY grenades and guerilla warfare, writes MAT COWARD
Hunan province’s transformation shows how state investment can lift millions from deprivation — but Western states avoid discussion of this while ramping up military spending instead, writes FIONA EDWARDS
The super-rich falsely claim inheritance tax changes will devastate small farmers, while millionaire landowners continue enjoying numerous tax advantages — why is the SNP supporting this nonsense, asks RICHARD LEONARD
In a powerful speech, celebrated Scottish-Egyptian actor and campaigner KHALID ABDALLA addressed the rally for Palestine on Whitehall this past Saturday on bearing witness to genocide’s unbearable truths
Undaunted by Big Oil success, ALAN SIMPSON looks at alternatives to lack of courage and imagination stifling the Labour government and it policies
DIC PENDERYN reports on the Communist Party’s Wales congress, where delegates debated plans for a radical manifesto and broad alliance to challenge Reform UK at the polls and make a clear break with Starmer and Westminster
Despite the change in government, the NHS staffing emergency and council funding shortfalls continue while military spending rises, writes RUBEN BRETT
WHEN he was in his nineties, former Labour leader Michael Foot was asked by the BBC how he would have reacted if Lord Halifax, the foreign secretary, had made peace with Hitler in 1940. “I’d have killed him,” said Footy. And he wasn’t speaking metaphorically.
In the run-up to the second world war, a number of unorthodox leftwingers had come to the conclusion that Britain could only win against Germany if it underwent a socialist revolution. This would inevitably involve a degree of civil war and the formation of workers’ militias.
As it turned out, of course, they were wrong. Britain remained capitalist — although forced, for the sake of efficiency and productivity, to temporarily adopt some socialistic measures — and yet successfully resisted invasion. But at the time, their views made a lot of sense to a lot of people.
More from this author
MAT COWARD explores how the ‘Tory-Radical’ Christian minister became a fiery opponent of the Poor Law, advocating armed resistance against its brutal cruelty against the emerging working class
Daring Scottish gothic, a murderer in their midst, the best spy story of the year and a classic list of clues
Taking up social work after being widowed transformed a Victorian liberal into a lifelong fighter for causes as wide-ranging as Sinn Fein and Indian independence to the right of women to drink in pubs, writes MAT COWARD
MAT COWARD declares this plant to be one that ‘everyone should grow’
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