George Osborne won’t say if he’d eat this ready meal

The Choice on the NHS – read the full text of Andy Burnham’s speech

When people look back, this could turn out to be no ordinary summer for the NHS. In just over two weeks, a group of mums from Darlington will set out from the North East, retracing the steps of the Jarrow marchers. The People’s March for the NHS aims to raise awareness about, in their words, “the Government’s assault on our most prized possession”. It remains to be seen whether it catches the public mood. But I think it might. There […]

Damian McBride says Labour’s policies are a “great, steaming pile of fudge”

Just when you thought he’d mostly disappeared from the political scene, Damian McBride, Gordon Brown’s former special advisor who was forced to resign in disgrace over emails he’d sent smearing senior Conservatives, has piped up again. This time, he’s hit out against the Labour leaderships’ current strategy, calling their policies a “great, steaming pile of fudge”. McBride’s latest intervention comes from the new epilogue to his memoirs Power Trip, originally released during the Labour Party Conference last year, extracts of which […]

The law alone won’t stop domestic violence – we need a culture change

By Maya Goodfellow

There’s been little, if any, criticism following Yvette Cooper’s announcement yesterday that if elected next May Labour will properly address domestic violence. In many ways, there’s good reason for this. As it stands, the system doesn’t do enough to enable women who experience domestic violence to bring their attackers to justice. As Cooper explained, in the UK 2 women a week will die at the hands of their current or former male and 1 in 4 women will experience domestic violence […]

Why we can’t do without All-Women Shortlists

By Luke Akehurst

The perennial issue of All Women Shortlists (AWS) has raised its head again, with Cynon Valley CLP extremely disgruntled about having an AWS imposed for its parliamentary selection after having already had a woman MP, Ann Clwyd, for well over two decades. Things seem to be escalating, with rumours of Ms Clwyd withdrawing her retirement and fighting the selection if it is an AWS, and CLP officers saying they will “go on strike” and not help administer the selection process.How […]

Burnham: Stop the “forced privatisation” of the NHS and give the public a say

Andy Burnham will make a speech in Manchester today, demanding that the agenda of privatisation within the NHS is stopped until the public are consulted. The latest in Labour’s summer series of speeches under the title The Choice, Burnham will spell out the difference between Labour’s approach to the health service and the Government’s current handling. He will say that NHS England should delay the signing of all contracts for clinical services with private contractors over the coming months, which would […]