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Why did I do it? It wasn’t easy, not for me anyway. Ten years ago it wasn’t fashionable in the Parliamentary Labour Party to be an Iraq War Rebel. And I was doing well. A young starlet in the party amongst a young dream-team intake that…
The tenth of April 1992 was a bleak, chilly day for Labour. Many – probably most – Labour supporters had woken up the day before believing that 13 years of Tory rule would be coming to an end as the country went to the polls. Sure, there…
There is an ongoing debate about the place of New Labour within the Labour Party tradition. Some, generally on the left of the party, argue that New Labour was a sharp departure from the principles on which the party was founded. Some…
The sitting Prime Minister enjoys a substantial lead (50-31) over the opposition leader when the electorate are asked who the best PM would be. Not now of course - this is from a week before the 1979 general election when Margaret Thatcher…
156 years ago today James Keir Hardie was born into grinding poverty in a one-bedroom cottage in North Lanarkshire. It was a hard life. Labour’s original founding father was first sent to work as a message runner for a shipping company at…
Following the sad death of Lord Alf Morris, Ed Miliband released the following statement: "I am deeply saddened to learn of the death of Alf Morris. He was a Labour man through and through. As a member, activist, MP and peer, he always…
I’ll let you into a guilty secret: I’m a sucker for brass bands. As a Yorkshireman who grew up about thirty miles from Durham, and a Labour activist with half my family from South Wales, I am still stirred by the solidarity thing. I…
New research by a number of distinguished experts published today by the Child Poverty Action Group explores how Labour’s unprecedented commitment to reduce child poverty affected families in the UK during its time in office. The verdict is…
The Labour Group in the Lords, like the Labour Party as a whole, is made up of both republicans and monarchists. Personally I am a monarchist – but I was married to a republican and our children have followed in his footsteps – and I will…
Humiliation in Bradford confirms our party cannot move successfully into the future without first dealing with its past. If after years of cuts, gloom and awful government, Labour defectors plus anti-coalition first-time voters do not see…
As usual, Luke Akehurst has written a better polling day article than I could ever manage. His advice is filled with the sagacity we’ve come to expect. But as I read it, it reminded me of a section in my Labour Annual 1897 on how socialists…
Jack Ashley, who died on Saturday aged 89, was the kind of politician who gives politics a good name. Many glowing tributes and obituaries have been offered to give a sense of this man’s life; this is a purely personal appreciation of…
