Category: Parliamentary Politics

‘What looks like politics, and imagines itself to be political, will one day unmask itself as a religious movement.’ — Kierkegaard Apart from a handful of loyal Corbynites still clutching at the sinking raft of the electoral Medusa, the MPs in what’s left of the Parliamentary Labour Party, as well as the Labour candidates who … Continue reading What Does The General Election Mean?

General Election Results this Decade 2010 (29,687,604 votes on a 65.1% turnout) Conservative Party: 10,703,754 votes (306 seats) Labour Party: 8,609,527 votes (258 seats) Liberal Democrat Party: 6,836,824 votes (57 seats) Scottish National Party: 491,386 votes (6 seats) Green Party: 285,616 votes (1 seat) Democratic Unionist Party: 168,216 votes (8 seats) Conservative-Liberal Democrat Coalition Government … Continue reading After Labour

I’ve stayed away from the media circus leading up to the latest General Election, but yesterday I watched Andrew Marr interviewing, in turn, Brandon Lewis, the Conservative Minister for State and Security; Nicola Sturgeon, the First Minister of Scotland and leader of the Scottish National Party; and John McDonnell, the Labour Shadow Chancellor of the … Continue reading The Parliamentary Road to Capitalism

One of the primary reasons the Labour Party gives for voting for it in a General Election is its perennial claim that: ‘A vote for any other party is a vote for the Tories!’ Leaving aside the fact that the Tory Party was dissolved in 1834, this attempt to reduce Parliamentary politics in this country … Continue reading Tactical Voting: A Socialist Option

The orthodox view of Brexit among the so-called Left in this country — which is to say, the view propagated by pro-capitalist liberal papers like The Guardian — is that it was a cunning plan dreamed up by Tory rebels to play on the inherent racism of the British working class and divide the Labour … Continue reading The Brexit Election: A Working-class Perspective

This is my first reading of the content relating to housing in the Labour Party Manifesto 2019, which was published today following Jeremy Corbyn’s speech at the launch of the manifesto in Birmingham. Well, it’s not a good start. Although, on the contents page for the manifesto, the National Health Service, Education, Police and Security Services, … Continue reading The Labour Party Manifesto on Housing 2019

For a Socialist Model of Housing Provision 1. All new housing must be social housing Every time a new residential development applies for planning permission in London there’s a debate about whether 15 per cent, or 30 per cent, or 45 per cent is an acceptable or sufficient share of so-called ‘affordable housing’ — without … Continue reading ASH Housing Manifesto 2019

I got through about 30 seconds of the Johnson-Corbyn ‘debate’ last night before I had to turn it off. In actuality, my computer turned itself off, as if the GCHQ camera hidden in its screen responded to the look on my face. My first reaction was one of shame, like watching two naked old men … Continue reading Running Man: The Johnson-Corbyn ‘Debate’

171 years ago The Communist Manifesto was published in Bishopsgate, London. Everyone has heard its famous phrases about a ‘spectre’ haunting Europe; about the history of all hitherto existing society being ‘the history of class struggle’; about capitalism being like a ‘sorcerer’ who can no longer control the power called up by his spells; and … Continue reading ‘Middle-class Socialism’: A Warning from History

‘Feel free to check your facts, timelines and who made decisions when.’ — Emma Dent Coad Yesterday Emma Dent Coad, the Labour candidate for North Kensington in the forthcoming General Election, issued a formal statement refuting the claims made in 2017 by the constituency’s former Conservative MP, Victoria Borwick — and repeated this week by … Continue reading A Vote for Labour is a Vote for . . . Emma Dent Coad