Secret consultation documents finally released after the Morning Star’s two-year freedom of information battle show the Home Office misrepresented public opinion, claiming support for policies that most respondents actually strongly criticised as dangerous and unfair, writes SOLOMON HUGHES
Latest editorial
Keir Starmer and the Labour’s supposed ‘broad church’
Normally in British politics, leftwingers defect right. Under Blair and now Starmer however, this trend seems to reverse, calling into question the ‘broad church’ that welcomes Tories and excludes socialists, writes KEITH FLETT
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer with former Conservative MP Natalie Elphicke in his parliamentary office in the House of Commons, London, after it was announced she has defected to Labour, hitting out at the "broken promises of Rishi Sunak's tired and chaotic government". Picture date: Wednesday May 8, 2024.
Our groundbreaking report reveals how private rail companies are bleeding millions from public coffers through exploitative leasing practices — but we have the solutions, writes Aslef Scottish organiser KEVIN LINDSAY
With Reform UK surging and Labour determined not to offer anything different from the status quo, a clear opportunity opens for the left, argues CLAUDIA WEBBE
Reform’s rise speaks to a deep crisis in Establishment parties – but relies on appealing to social and economic grievances the left should make its own, argues NICK WRIGHT
This year’s Bristol Radical History Festival focused on the persistent threats of racism, xenophobia and, of course, our radical collective resistance to it across Ireland and Britain, reports LYNNE WALSH
A maverick’s self-inflicted snake bites could unlock breakthrough treatments – but they also reveal deeper tensions between noble scientific curiosity and cold corporate callousness, write ROX MIDDLETON, LIAM SHAW and MIRIAM GAUNTLETT
The FBU is demanding 52 weeks of full pay for women firefighters, highlighting the unique health risks they face — and the continuing need to recruit and retain more women if policies like this are still not in place, writes SEONA HART
HISTORICALLY, political defections in Britain have tended to go from left to right.
Beyond individual renegades, there are two significant markers: Ramsay MacDonald’s decision to split Labour and form a national government in 1931 and the departure of right-wing Labour MPs to the SDP (now the Lib Dems) in the early 1980s.
The 1930s also offered two further examples of significant splits. The first was Oswald Mosley’s New Party, which led to fascism. The second was the Independent Labour Party (ILP), which tried to recreate an independent socialist presence outside of Labour but was unable to do so.
More from this author
KEITH FLETT revisits the 1978 origins of Britain’s May Day bank holiday — from Michael Foot’s triumph to Thatcher’s reluctant acceptance — as Starmer’s government dodges calls to expand our working-class celebrations
From bemoaning London’s ‘cockneys’ invading seaside towns to negotiating holiday rents, the founders of scientific socialism maintained a wry detachment from Victorian Easter customs while using the break for health and politics, writes KEITH FLETT
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
