The Joy of Six 1477Martin Parr looks at successful and unsuccessful attempts to depose a prime minister: "Labour, significantly, has never toppled a prime minister. It's not in the culture of so cooperativist a party: there's no equivalent of the 1922 Committee. And whenever it might have happened, the challenger blinked: Herbert Morrison with Attlee; Roy Jenkins with Wilson; David Miliband with Brown; Wes Streeting may have just joined the roster of the rueful." Sumaiya Motara on the brutal contest for low-paid work: "It's like The Hunger Games, but you're all trying to get a job in a shop where you're going to be ... (more) |
The effect on children when a parent loses a parliamentary electionMatthew Spender's book A House in St John's Wood is a portrait of his father, the poet Stephen Spender. Stephen's father was Harold Spender and the Michael mentioned below is Stephen's brother Michael Spender. The third brother was Humphrey Spender- they were very much a family of Wikipedia entries. Early in his book, Matthew Spender writes: When Stephen was twelve, Harold stood as a Liberal candidate in a general election. My father remembered being hauled around Bath in a pony-carriage with his two brothers, each with a placard round his neck saying "Vote for Daddy". Harold lost and the effect ... (more) |
Ramadan for Moslems and Ash Wednesday for ChristiansI am sure that I cannot be the only person to notice that this week marks the start of two major religious festivals. In fact, it is more than that - it is the celebration of two festivals which have many similarities. Christian will have enjoyed Pancake Tuesday yesterday. It is a day when you brought all your food together and ate it to mark the start today of Lent. Today is Ash Wednesday. During Lent it is customary for true believers to 'sacrifice' a luxury or pleasure typically food. At the end of Lent, they celebrate Easter and do ... (more) |
Palestine and Israel: high time the UK stopped standing byLiberal Democrats along with the SNP, the Green Party and several Independent MPs have recognised that Israel has committed genocide as defined by the Genocide Convention. So far so good. The bad news is that the failure to act by the British and other governments frankly amounts to complicity in war crimes. The UK Government still hasn't announced how it plans to follow up the 2024 ICJ judgements which warned of the plausible risk of genocide, confirmed that Israeli settlements are illegal and stated that other countries should not have any dealings with those settlements. The Trump 'Peace Plan' has ... (more) |
Why postpone elections?It can be argued that the Labour Government's decision last year to postpone the local elections due next next May was sensible. The councils concerned are to be reorganised and their new councillors would be in office for only a year. Then the councils i would be abolished. Why waste money on elections when it could be better used for mending the potholes, as Labour's current response argues now that "legal advice" obtained as a result of protests by Farage's Refom Party indicates that the move is illegal and will probably be reversed if it goes to court. Such an ... (more) |
Spencer Davis Group: Every Little Bit HurtsRecorded at the Marquee Club in February 1965, so Steve Winwood (on vocals and piano) is 16 here. (more) |
British, northern, not leavingLast week, Rupert Lowe launched his new "Restore" party. Restore what, exactly? Strip away the branding and the flag-waving and what you're left with isn't renewal. It's resentment. It's grievance politics dressed up as patriotism. To me, it looks like a diet BNP the same division, repackaged for the social media age. And I'm tired of pretending it isn't dangerous. Circling this movement are voices openly advocating "re-migration" the idea that British citizens like me should be sent "back" somewhere else. Steve Laws has pushed exactly that kind of rhetoric. According to this worldview, my place in this country is ... (more) |
Reform's hate agenda as they unveil Truss mark two shadow teamThe Independent reports that Reform UK has been accused of "pitching for the votes of misogynists, homophobes, racists and antisemites" after Suella Braverman, the party's new equalities chief, announced plans to scrap the Equality Act. The paper says that at a press conference in London on Tuesday, Nigel Farage unveiled his party's top team, appointing Ms Braverman as the party's education, skills and equalities spokesperson: Addressing the conference, she said Reform would repeal the Equality Act on day one if it wins the next election, claiming that Britain is being "ripped apart by diversity, equality and inclusion" policies. The Equality ... (more) |
Lloyd George's oratory owed a heavy debt to the music hallEmbed from Getty ImagesIn 1992 the journalist Edward Pearce published a diary of that year's general election campaign. It was reviewed for the London Review of Books by Peter Clarke. Here is Clarke on Lloyd George: Lloyd George, too, did his bit to lower the tone of politics once secularisation had made the pulpit an obsolescent model. As A.J.P. Taylor liked to point out, Lloyd George's platform oratory owed a heavy debt to the music hall. He could control an audience with the inspired timing of a stand-up comic. His one-liner about the House of Lords - "five hundred men, ... (more) |
How many councillors has Reform UK lost since May?Here is a list of the councillors which Reform has shed from the May 2025 local elections and from those elections in by-elections since. The latest update is the departure of two North Northamptonshire councillors. Donna Edmunds (Shropshire, suspended by Reform UK and then quit the party) Luke Shingler (Warwickshire, now an independent) Desmond Clarke (Nottinghamshire, resigned as councillor) Andrew Kilburn (Durham, resigned as a councillor) Wayne Titley (Staffordshire, resigned as a councillor) Mark Broadhurst (Doncaster, expelled by Reform) Adam Smith (West Northamptonshire, suspended by Reform and then expelled) John Bailey (Durham, resigned as a councillor) Daniel Taylor (Kent, suspended ... (more) |