Letters to the Editor – week ending 16 August 2026

Read what people have been writing to our editor about this week. Find out how to share your own views here.

Labour’s National Policy Forum

Dear James,

An excellent and important internal report article on the period of Keir Starmer’s tenure as Prime Minister.  

In the total absence of mass media coverage, we are most grateful for this incisive article. 

The positive report identifies programmes that were already delivering, reforms that had begun and others that were still being developed. It is, in that sense, a substantial outline of the policy work undertaken by the Starmer government.

Small suggestion: Please, please, please lead with positive headlines. For the morale of us Labour members. Also, so we do not inadvertently give fodder to the anti-Labour mass media in its hunt for anti-Labour hysteria.

Lastly, Thanks to the entire LabourList team for your work. We, who debate, support and correct online/SM fakery against Labour are very grateful, and use the information you give.

Your fact checking is also excellent.

I have made a donation to Labourlist to show my personal appreciation..

Kind regards,

John Bajina

*****

James Tibbitts is not exactly wrong when he says that economic growth in every postcode  and hope are what make Andy Burnham’s policies more than a collection of discrete  missions. 

But this still does fully convey the analytical depth and coherence  of Burnham’s position   which derives from a critique of the neo-liberalism which has so damaged our country.

There is nothing particularly original about that; many have written at length in the same vein. But it does mean that Burnham has grasped the scale of the task which confronts the country. He wants both a  new economic and a new political “settlement”.

As yet, still concentrating on immediate remedial measures, it is not clear where he intends to start on this task nor do we know how determinedly he will deal with the inevitable  resistance and obfuscation by vested interests and  those who feel threatened. Yet his analysis, his language and the strategy which flows from it already takes him a long way from the politics of Keir Starmer.   

David Parker

LabourList: A Forum for Policy Debate

Douglas McAllister MP points to a self-evident truth when he welcomes Andy Burnham’s recent observation that we should sort out palliative and end of life care before we even begin to contemplate legalising assisted dying. With social care broken, and the NHS struggling with ever increasing demands, it is inevitable that we risk vulnerable, sick, elderly and disabled patients feeling they are a burden and that they are not valued or respected. Until that pressure is removed, no Party that sees itself as a champion of the vulnerable and a deliverer of hope should be complicit in any way in the introduction of assisted suicide. 

Yours faithfully,

Chris Whitehouse

*****

Emma,

Your piece on the ‘Foundations of failure‘ neatly pulls together early prisoner release and several other issues where the construction sector is key. You could have added prison/halfway-house capacity building specifically; the housing crisis generally; accommodation for the homeless, and asylum seekers; together with training places in construction and prefab industries, and devolution of responsibility for finding sites to Local Authorities.

There are opportunities here for factory made prefabricated, movable units distributed around LA sourced sites in every town.

The funding can come from QE created money as was used to bail out the banks after 2008 and businesses during COVID lockdown – £900bn of it!

Regards,

Colin Bryant
Wakefield

*****

Now is surely the time for the Labour government to renationalise the water industry. It is in crisis.

The prioritisation of shareholder profit over infrastructure maintenance is coming home to roost.

In Redbridge and Essex, water mains have burst, causing mayhem for residents. 

The Redbridge Labour council has been forced to take on the responsibilities of supplying water and supporting residents. Actually, the job of Thames Water. The council have done well. 

These incidents are the sign of a crumbling infrastructure, starved of investment for decades.

If reservoirs had been built, leaks fixed and sewage disposal prioritised, this situation would not exist. Let’s not forget, earlier this year, there was record rainfall.

Andy Burnham says he wants to address the problems caused over the past 40 years of misguided policy. Well, renationalising the water would be a great place to start. Privatisation of water exemplifies all that has been wrong about the way the utilities have been run over the past 40 years – private profit over public welfare.

A move to renationalise would be popular, it is also essential. It is simply reckless to allow these private companies to continue building debt and  running the infrastructure down at a time when the challenges of climate change demand an efficient system based on the common good. So, be brave Andy, grasp the nettle and renationalise water, you know you and everyone else wants you to.

Paul Donovan
Former Labour councillor
London

*****

To Editor Labour List

ThinkLabour’s recent polling write-up might play well in Westminster think-tank circles, but it misreads both the party membership and the needs of working-class communities. 

Pitching defence against welfare as a zero-sum trade-off relies on the same tired orthodox economics that brought this country to its knees.

Public spending isn’t a deadweight cost to be trimmed at the first sign of pressure. When the state invests directly in real industrial capacity, public infrastructure, and a skilled workforce, it generates the economic growth and tax yield needed to secure both our national defence and our social safety net.

Even ThinkLabour’s own numbers expose the flaw in their narrative.

The moment you move past abstract questions and ask members about actual cuts—like Child Benefit or the State Pension—the majority overwhelmingly reject them.

Members aren’t demanding recycled austerity or Tory-lite accounting tricks. Calling us “pragmatic” just because we care about the nation’s security and finances isn’t a licence to abandon working people.

Real pragmatism means using supply-side investment to rebuild Britain’s productive capacity, not playing zero-sum games with working-class lives.

Graham Poulloin
Bournemouth Labour Party

*****

Dear Emma,

My name is Tania Karmokar and I am an ambassador of The Borgen Project, a non-profit campaign that aims to bring attention to global poverty and spread awareness about the Official Development Assistance (ODA). With the internet today being altered by the nails and hammers of online trends, I think it is best to use the latest social media trends to learn about why such foreign policies matter.

To give a little bit of context, in countries like the UK, Germany, France, the US, a percentage of the gross national income is allocated for overseas aid. Last year, only 0.43 percent of the GNI was allocated; a drastic reduction from the previous 0.7 percent. This change caused a substantial reduction in funding available to provide healthcare treatment against life-threatening diseases, such as TB, AIDS, and Malaria, in countries like Ethiopia,

Mozambique, Bangladesh, etc. Moreover, it also caused a widening in the educational andgender disparity in these regions as the resources were no longer available to keep schools running, causing children, especially girls, to stay behind.

In TikTok terms –

UK give financial aid to countries in need – Good
UK reduce financial aid to countries in need – Bad
UK go back to pre-2025 aid amount – Good
UK continue with lowered aid amount – Bad
UK lower aid amount further – Very Bad
People email their MPs about increasing foreign aid budget – Good
MPs advocating for increase in foreign aid budget in House of Commons – Very Good.

So, let us all take 1 minute out of our day to email our MPs about the ODA. After all, more is not just merrier, it also stronger in making good change happen! More information about foreign policy and global poverty can be accessed on borgenproject.org

Thank you for taking the time to read this.

Yours sincerely,

Tania Karmokar

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