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Lifting the ban on the Daily Worker
In the middle of WWII, the forerunner to the Morning Star was banned by the state for calling for colonial freedom, campaigning against profiteering, for union rights and for a better life for the workers amid the Blitz, explains JOHN ELLISON
Daily Worker Ban

THE Daily Worker, in being and in action since 1930, became the Morning Star 1966. Under whichever name, the paper was and is the only daily in Britain focused on exposing the mechanics of capitalism and challenging its management on behalf of working people.

But in January 1941 the Daily Worker was suppressed by the Winston Churchill government and did not reappear until September 7 1942, 80 years ago today. Popular pressure compelled the government to lift the ban.

Herbert Morrison, then the home secretary for Labour, took the lead in imposing the ban. His memorandum to the Cabinet on December 23 1940 claimed that the paper had “striven to create in the reader a state of mind in which he will be unlikely to be keen to assist the war effort.”

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