From London’s holly-sellers to Engels’s flaming Christmas centrepiece, the plum pudding was more than festive fare in Victorian Britain, says KEITH FLETT
Don’t forget to drop the debt
Now is the perfect time to highlight and confront the systems of neocolonial exploitation of developing countries by unjust loans — and we can fight the fight here in Britain, writes KEN LIVINGSTONE
Once the bustling heart of Christian pilgrimage, Bethlehem now faces shuttered hotels, empty streets and a shrinking Christian community, while Israel’s assault on Gaza and the tightening grip of occupation destroy hopes of peace at the birthplace of Christ, writes Father GEOFF BOTTOMS
From a lockdown digital project to a vital tool for class solidarity, ROBERT POOLE and HENRY FOWLER reflect on half-a-decade of struggle
After years hidden away, Oldham’s memorial to six local volunteers who died fighting fascism in the Spanish civil war has been restored to public view, marking both a victory for campaigners and a renewed tribute to the town’s proud International Brigade heritage, says ROB HARGREAVES
The June 2025 attacks on Iran have heightened the risk of a wider war, exposed the fiction of a rules-based international order and left ordinary Iranians trapped between external aggression and internal repression, says the Committee for Defence of Iranian People’s Rights
While pretending to seek peace, Europe is heading toward a collision course with Russia – using security guarantees, troop deployments, expropriation and censorship as tools, writes SEVIM DAGDELEN
A WWI hero, renowned ornithologist, medical doctor, trade union organiser and founder member of the Communist Party of Great Britain all rolled in one. MAT COWARD tells the story of a life so improbable it was once dismissed as fiction
THE international coronavirus pandemic has shown more than ever how both in society here in Britain and in terms of different countries and continents all over the globe, we are more intertwined that ever.
In this situation, there are two possible responses. Either both societies and international relations come out of this crisis with the values of solidarity and humanitarianism strengthened.
Or we see a new strengthening of the politics of Trump, the Brazilian far-right President Bolsonaro and others triumph, a politics that is prepared to sacrifice the health and lives of the poorest around the globe for future mega-profits for the 1 per cent.
One issue that has come to the fore during this crisis internationally, has been that of the vast amounts of debt low-income countries around the world “owe” to the big (often formerly colonial) powers, including through global institutions such as the IMF and the World Bank.
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While Hardie, MacDonald and Wilson faced down war pressure from their own Establishment, today’s leadership appears to have forgotten that opposing imperial adventures has historically defined Labour’s moral authority, writes KEITH FLETT
Despite Labour’s promises to bring things ‘in-house,’ the Justice Secretary has awarded notorious outsourcing outfit Mitie a £329 million contract to run a new prison — despite its track record of abuse and neglect in its migrant facilities, reports SOLOMON HUGHES
Health Secretary Wes Streeting taking £53k from Tory-linked recruiter and outsourcer Peter Hearn’s OPD Group is a great example of how Labour’s rich donors shape policies targeting the poor – not their wealth, writes SOLOMON HUGHES
CARLOS MARTINEZ condemns Europe’s failure to develop genuine autonomy from US hegemony, as leaders like Starmer and Macron cling to a declining imperial order rather than building good relations with the emerging powers