MATTHEW BROWN reviews the birth and record of the Tory-led government and considers the current short-comings of the anti-cuts movement.
Let’s go back a year. In fact, let’s go back more than a year, to shortly before the general election when a Conservative majority appeared almost inevitable. It may seem difficult to believe now, but across [...]

BARRY WINTER introduces the ILP’s new perspective document, The ILP: Our Politics, arguing that our political morality forms the basis of our critique of capitalism.
When you look back at the history of the left in politics, whether in the UK or internationally, you could be forgiven thinking that with its often terrible record, why bother? [...]

Around 40 ILP members, friends and fellow travellers gathered in Scarborough on 7/8 May for the organisations’s annual weekend school, where the politics of the ILP, the coalition government and the Labour Party came under scrutiny.
“Why have people like us not given up?” asked Barry Winter at the start of two days of discussion, [...]

The 2011 ILP Weekend School
Saturday 7 & Sunday 8 May 2011
On the agenda:

the politics of the Conservative-led government and the growing opposition to the cuts
the challenges facing the Labour leadership
rebuilding the party’s internal democracy (we will be discussing the Party’s Refounding Labour review and consultation document)
the ILP’s political perspective (read the NAC’s draft statement for [...]

The TUC’s anti-cuts protest was a good start, but much remains to be done to turn this widespread opposition into a movement that can really challenge the government.
Saturday’s TUC march against government cuts exceeded most expectations in terms of size and the good nature of the protest. Giving a proverbial two fingers to smug media [...]

Ahead of the march for the alternative, set to see thousands throng the capital to protest against the government cuts, the country’s biggest union reveals that many people in the UK are now “surviving, not living”.
An independent poll tracked the concerns of 140,000 working people over four months from December 2010 until the early [...]

George Osborne read the last rites for the Big Society in his Budget, as he did not stump up the cash to revive the Prime Minister’s pet project.
Unite, the largest union in the country, said that the Chancellor failed to plug the £4.5bn shortfall in funding for the not for profit sector and that the [...]

The recent decision by Compass, the centre left pressure group, to open up to members of all parties has prompted a series of resignations. MATTHEW BROWN looks at the implications for advocates of progressive realignment.
Last Saturday (12 March), a group of Compass members wrote a letter to the Guardian announcing their decision to resign from [...]

Unite’s campaign to stop the privatisation of the NHS Blood Service has received huge public support which is still growing.
In under a week, the union’s petition demanding that David Cameron stops the blood money was signed by 25,000 people (go to http://action.unitetheunion.com/page/s/BloodMoney?source=UniteTwitter to add your name).
The petition was launched last Friday 3rd March and the [...]

When confronted with a familiar problem, the wise either resort to the sure solution or, remembering past follies, try to muster an imaginative and novel way out of their bind. Sadly the current government hasn’t displayed such dexterity in fashioning responses to our economic crisis, rather it responds to familiar problems with failed solutions, says [...]