[…] book (1) kind of parallel some of the things that I have been writing about elsewhere. I began publishing Lobster in 1983; and I also joined the Labour Party that year, partly, I confess, because it seemed a likely source of stories for a local lefty magazine I was involved in. In the mid […]
[…] sustain its hegemony. This is actually more evident in Britain than the US and, indeed, much of Marshall’s book concerns itself with the British situation. Here, New Labour has completely replaced the Tories as the main party of British capitalism by hijacking the historical Labour Party in violation of its own constitution. But while […]
Donovan Pedelty Prometheus Press, Builth Wells, Powys, £13.50 This is a fascinating book. As the Labour Party approaches its 100th birthday, Donovan Pedelty critically assesses the extent to which it has realised its aim. In a detailed and well-argued account, he shows that whereas Labour always espoused equality, nevertheless the gulf between rich and […]
[…] careers and pensions – the really important things, after all – stayed on track. The British security and intelligence services had long since stopped worrying about the Labour Party. The Left in the Parliamentary Labour Party had lost interest in the subject, and though Neil Kinnock had shown a flicker of interest in the […]
The first of three essays in this issue are about New Labour and its origins. I put mine first because of its general, context-setting nature. The subsequent essays, on the Successor Generation and the operations in the British Unions, deepen and thicken the section towards the end of the opening essay which discusses New […]
[…] Blair London: Little, Brown, 2008, h/b, £18.99 The relentless harrying of Neil Kinnock by the Murdoch press at the time of the 1992 general election outraged Labour Party people, among them Cherie Blair. This was the general election when The Sun proudly boasted that it was its continual ridicule and abuse of the […]
[PDF file]: […] of the door, the author of Broken Heartlands finds little to comfort those hoping to see Sir Keir Starmer in Downing Street any time soon. While the Labour leader may want to flush his efforts to block Brexit down the memory hole along with his predecessor Jeremy Corbyn, he has far to go in […]
[PDF file]: […] it by two events. The first was the death of its author earlier this year; the second has been the recurrence of the ‘doom’ narrative of the Labour Party. This fatalistic style of thinking has reappeared following Labour’s fairly dismal election results in May 2021, and its previous drubbing in the 2019 general election. […]
The unspeakable Martin Kettle of The Guardian is a political journalist who has been pretty close to, and supportive of, New Labour since the 1990s. His article ‘The special relationship that squandered a noble cause’ (27 May 2006) opened with this: ‘The long arc of Tony Blair’s rise and decline has been punctuated by […]
Edward Pearce London: Little, Brown, 2002, £25, h/b. Compared to the present crop of media-trained, PR-conscious, line-following, careerist pigmies who comprise the current Labour Cabinet, Denis Healey looks like a giant from a golden age. Before his well known roles as Minister of Defence and Chancellor of the Exchequer (during the Tory-induced inflation […]
