Labour prospects in May elections may be irrevocably damaged by Birmingham Council’s costly refusal to settle the year-long dispute, warns STEVE WRIGHT
While Rome (or California) burns
In a shockingly frank report, the US military has now admitted it is totally unprepared for the breakdown and collapse climate change will wreak cross the world. But Britain has a way out, explains ALAN SIMPSON
HENRY FOWLER and ROB POOLE explain the significance of today’s Megapicket
One hundred years after 1.7m workers shut the country down in defence of the miners, the struggles that sparked the 1926 General Strike are still with us – and will be honoured on London’s May Day march this year, writes MARY ADOSSIDES
The Labour Growth Group and its think tank partner, the Good Growth Foundation, have taken funding from major lobbying firms linked to housebuilders, banks and Heathrow – raising questions about corporate influence at the heart of Starmer’s pro-growth project. SOLOMON HUGHES reports
The fatal shooting of Alex Pretti, a registered nurse and union member, has sparked nationwide protests and renewed calls from National Nurses United to dismantle Ice and related agencies, says MARK GRUENBERG
A Vatican photo-op, a hard-right donor and a rhetoric of mass deportations reveal how appeals to ‘Christian values’ are being reshaped by Reform and Tory MPs, says SOLOMON HUGHES
AT a time riven by contradictions and confusion, it is important to celebrate what’s worth celebrating. Labour’s pre-manifesto pledges — to build only zero-carbon homes from 2022 and make 27 million homes energy efficient by 2030 — could mark the beginning of a climate politics general election. Not before time.
It isn’t just that Labour’s Warm Homes for All programme would create 450,000 jobs or that low-income households will be eligible for grants (with no upfront costs), with the rest of us having interest-free loans for the work. What matters more is that this requires a new systems-based approach to delivering tomorrow’s climate security.
Sure, it will be brilliant if Labour can supply over six million homes with heat pumps and 5.3 million homes with solar thermal systems by 2030. The key, however, will be how these fit into new frameworks of more localised energy management. Smart technologies make it all possible. But “smart politics” will be needed to make collective interdependency, rather than individual consumption, the centrepiece of tomorrow’s security. A recognition of such interdependence is dawning in unexpected places.
Similar stories
As the dollar falters and US power turns predatory, Britain and Europe must abandon transatlantic illusions and build a collectivist alternative before the system implodes, writes ALAN SIMPSON
The collapse of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation poses an existential threat — but do today’s politicians have the capacity to deliver the more resilient and sustainable economics of tomorrow, wonders ALAN SIMPSON
ALAN SIMPSON warns of a dystopian crossroads where Trump’s wrecking ball meets AI-driven alienation, and argues only a Green New Deal can repair our fractured society before techno-feudalism consumes us all
As the ‘NRx movement’ plots to replace democracy with corporate-feudal dictatorship, Britain must pursue a radical alternative of local food security and genuine wealth redistribution to withstand the coming upheaval, writes ALAN SIMPSON