I’ve found Luke Akehurst to be a friendly chap. He may be pretty sectarian in print and on the blogosphere, but as a leading light of the shadowy organisation, Labour First, he’s traditional Labour Right and at least seems to be at the right party unlike some of his Blairite friends in the Progress camp. […]
Posts Tagged ‘Progress’
Purple book shows modernisers are still Tory-isers
Sep 19th, 2011 by Michael Meacher.What do these ideas add up to? Devolve power from Whitehall, leave the big state behind, elect mayors with powers over policing, abolish the Department for Communities and Local Government, compete for new providers where schools are thought to be failing, provide education credits for parents to move their children to other schools, make all […]
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Labour’s Party-within-a-party: latest funding figures
Sep 6th, 2011 by Jon Lansman.Progress, Labour’s Blairite party-within-a-party, has now raised over £2.8million to fund its activities. Its annual income is now well in excess of the maximum ever achieved by the Militant tendency (which raised £283,818 in 1986 according to its published fighting fund totals) and it doesn’t finance the production of a weekly newspaper. Although it is understood that Ed […]
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Blue will never be the new Red
May 18th, 2011 by Andy Newman.The “Blue Labour” agenda associated with Maurice Glasman has generated considerable discussion, and the recent interview with Progress shows that there is an element of iconoclasm from Glasman himself, where he expresses deliberately provocative positions, for example lamenting that the current generation of trade union leaders don’t match up to Sir Ken Jackson, or suggesting that […]
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Ed Miliband: against factionalism… except for certain factions?
Apr 22nd, 2011 by Jon Lansman.Ed Miliband is against factionalism. Succeeding Blair and Brown, he has to be. As has been pointed out, the “paradox of post-factionalism” is that everyone counts heads to make sure he is. And to be fair, he’s even opened the door to some of those whom the Blairites judged unpersons — though he hasn’t shown […]
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Welcome to the Blairite Party-within-a-party
Mar 11th, 2011 by Jon Lansman.This weekend, in the sumptuous surroundings of a Jacobean-style Victorian country mansion in the beautiful Lincolnshire countryside, New Labour enthusiasts gather for a weekend “political school“. At £175 including overnight accommodation, two lunches, dinner, breakfast and refreshments, it’s a snip thanks to the generous sponsorship of Bell Pottinger, founded by Maggie’s favourite Ad man, and […]
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Blairite revisionism over Labour’s defeat must be challenged
Mar 3rd, 2011 by Owen Jones.Narratives are clever political devices. You take a particular event, particularly one that has confused or traumatised people; and, before anyone else gets there first, stamp on a story explaining why it happened. Repeat it enough, pass it off as commonsense, and soon it will become received wisdom. You can then cleverly use it for […]
