Labour movement history in Britain shows workers secured reforms through collective pressure and political representation, rather than being gifted from above, writes KEITH FLETT
UNTIL recently, current events were held to pass into history at around the 30-year mark, which was when official government papers were released of that period.
In more recent times many documents have been opened up after 20 years, meaning that the early 2000s period of British history has now made its initial entry to the historical record.
In the 2001 general election, nearly a repeat of the result of 1997, Labour had a majority of 167. At the next election in 2005, Labour’s majority dropped to 66. Tony Blair was replaced by Gordon Brown as PM in 2006.
By-election poll puts Starmer's future on a knife-edge
Who you ask and how you ask matter, as does why you are asking — the history of opinion polls shows they are as much about creating opinions as they are about recording them, writes socialist historian KEITH FLETT
Sixty Red-Green seats in a hung parliament could force Labour to choose between the death of centrism or accommodation with the left — but only if enough of us join the Greens by July 31 and support Zack Polanski’s leadership, writes JAMES MEADWAY
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


