JOE BESWICK of the London Renters Union talks to the Morning Star’s new Left on Record programme
The Cato Street 205th anniversary – an alternative tradition of protest
The legacy of an 1820 conspiracy in revenge for Peterloo resonates down the ages, argues KEITH FLETT

IT IS 205 years since the Cato Street conspiracy was “uncovered” on February 23 1820 and the leaders duly despatched at the scaffold or to Australia.
It warrants a section in EP Thompson’s classic account of the Making of the English Working Class (1963) but until recently has been largely overlooked both by mainstream and left historians.
The conspirators, who, like others before them, had been infiltrated by government spies — a reminder that spycops are nothing new — planned to attack a “Cabinet dinner” in central London, murder the prime minister, home secretary etc and display their heads on poles.
More from this author

Facing economic turmoil, Jim Callaghan’s government rejected Tony Benn’s alternative economic strategy in favour of cuts that paved the way for Thatcherism — and the cuts-loving Labour of the present era, writes KEITH FLETT

Starmer’s slash-and-burn approach to disability benefits represents a fundamental break with Labour’s founding mission to challenge the idle rich rather than punish the vulnerable poor, argues KEITH FLETT

The formation of the Labour Representation Committee in 1900 marked the beginning of interconnected and contested strategies — parliamentary and industrial — seeking ways to advance working-class interests, writes KEITH FLETT

KEITH FLETT looks back 50 years to when the Iron Lady was elected Tory leader…