Grassroots « Labour Uncut

We owe it to young people to keep sex ed on the curriculum, says Hannah McFaull

15/08/2010, 02:00:38 PM

Question: What is a clitoris?

Answer: Is it a fish in the Amazon?

Question: What happens if you’re having sexual intercourse and the condom splits?

Answer: Do you wash her (sic) out with white spirit?

Genuine questions from a genuine sex education lesson in an east London school with a group of 15 year olds. Aside from cringing at the second answer, the more worrying indication is that we’re not doing enough or starting early enough when talking to our children about their bodies, relationships and sexuality.

Imagine that even the basic, inadequate wisdom that we currently impart wasn’t compulsory or standardised. Not knowing the basic human anatomy of your own body, let alone the anatomy of anyone else’s. Not understanding how to prevent the spread of disease. Not appreciating that you have a choice in avoiding becoming a parent until you’re ready.

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Economy: Sam Dale says we must stop apologising and start fighting back

14/08/2010, 11:00:51 AM

David Cameron and Nick Clegg have clearly made it their political priority to blame the recession and slow recovery on Labour.

Since the election there have been daily attacks on Labour’s economic record, with the government’s inheritance invariably described as a mess. Dave and Nick accuse Labour of economic incontinence and spending money it didn’t have. There was even the sinister suggestion – which should have caused far more offence than it did – that Labour employed a scorched earth policy before leaving office.

Peter Mandelson is portrayed as a madman throwing money around with no thought for the consequences. Dave and Nick simply can’t believe that Labour wanted to help a Sheffield firm in the recession. In their deficit-obsessed, warped minds, this is a total dereliction of duty. And, of the course, there was the ill-judged joke that Liam Byrne left for his successor, feeding the government narrative.

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Paul Corby remembers Jimmy Reid

12/08/2010, 09:00:45 AM

At the Upper Clyde shipyard, 1972

The great socialist folk singer, Pete Seeger, always said that he wanted to be with “the live hearts”, wherever they may be and in whatever numbers they were fighting the struggle. Jimmy Reid was always a “live heart”.

To begin Jimmy’s life near the end, he eventually rejected Labour for the SNP because he felt Labour to be paradoxically a Thatcherite party.

And he was right to say that Labour had left its working class base behind, and Labour had sadly lost confidence in working class people. Most of its leaders and indeed most of the leading trade union bureaucracy no longer live, mix and socialise with the working class they represent. But Jimmy was absolutely at one with them to the end. (more…)

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Kirstin Hay says that Johanna Baxter would make the NEC more accountable

11/08/2010, 02:23:34 PM

I joined the Labour party just after the general election, because I felt that I had taken a Labour government for granted, and now felt I had to fight to get one back. I didn’t even know then that the national executive committee (NEC) existed, let alone who my representative on it was. Odd perhaps for someone so new to politics but, given the number of internal elections taking place right now, I felt it my duty to find out how my new party operated before casting my votes.

I soon discovered that the NEC is important. It is the governing body that oversees the overall direction of the party and our policy-making process. The six representatives in the CLP section are elected bi-annually by one member one vote and this year we have our chance to decide who will represent us.

Call me old fashioned, but I would quite like to know who is standing for election to this vital part of the party machinery. The party seems to think that I need three months to decide on the leadership election, yet only three weeks to make a considered decision about who represents me on the NEC (the party will only confirm who is on the ballot when they send out the ballot packs in September). Is this transparency, consistency or accountability in action? I don’t think so. (more…)

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We should be punishing the Tories in local elections, says Edward Carlsson Browne

10/08/2010, 12:30:49 PM

The jury is still out on new Labour’s worst mistake in government. It could be the Iraq War, tuition fees, 10p tax, regulating the banks or failing to call an election in 2007. It could be that the Blair-Brown feud was allowed to continue for a decade. Those who believe the rot started early might argue that it was when we decided to accept a donation from Bernie Ecclestone.

In my opinion, it was none of these things. I believe that the greatest failing of the last government, in which Blair and Brown were both culpable, was that they stood by as our ranks were decimated in local government. Our support fell every year until 2009, when we reached our lowest number of seats since local government was reorganised in 1973. Our slight rebound this year was our second worst result in this time.

Even in the 1980s, when the party was less popular than gonorrhea and ward meetings were slightly more painful, we could win local elections. We were ahead in national equivalent vote share estimates for half of that decade. Since 2006, we haven’t hit 30% in the same measure. (more…)

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Helen Godwin Teige warns the Tories against another lost generation

09/08/2010, 04:41:19 PM

The recent media circus surrounding the Raoul Moat case did lead to some interesting discussion about the ‘lost generation’ of working class men who have lost their standing in society as a result of the steady decline in manufacturing since the 1980s.

Numerous commentators discussed fathers and their sons who have spent much of their lives on benefits and with little or no expectation of finding work. This is an issue across the UK, though one more noticeable in the former industrial heartlands of the North, and especially former mining towns that experienced mass unemployment after the pit closures of the Thatcher years. (more…)

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The chair of London young Labour says Oona’s ageist attacks are not cool

07/08/2010, 03:44:01 PM

Like many London Labour members, I’ve been keeping a close eye on our mayoral selection, which has galvanised and polarised London activists more than the leadership campaigns.

Several times over the past few weeks, I’ve been struck by negative comments made by Oona King and her campaign highlighting Ken Livingstone’s age.

This blogpost by Oona offers one of the clearest examples:

“And I don’t think Ken Livingstone is the way to go. He may qualify for Britain’s Got Talent but only on UK Gold.” (more…)

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An elected party chair mustn’t become the plaything of MPs, says Joanne Milligan

06/08/2010, 12:30:45 PM

Many weeks ago, Labour leadership contender David Miliband proposed an election for the role of party chair as a step towards ensuring that there’s a voice for party members at the shadow cabinet table.

Discussion of the idea then escalated following a Jon Cruddas’s speech to the Labour Friends of Searchlight’s Organising to Win conference in which he declared that he would put himself forward for the post.

Subsequently, both national executive committee (NEC) member Peter Kenyon and NEC candidate Luke Akehurst took to the blogosphere to offer their views. A little surprisingly – for me anyway – I find more common ground with Peter than Luke on this issue (don’t worry Luke – that doesn’t mean you’ve lost my vote). (more…)

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It’s time to wake up and smell the coffee, argues Richard Darlington

05/08/2010, 11:13:37 AM

After the Tory defeat in the 2005 general election, Michael Ashcroft published an analysis called ‘Smell the coffee: a wake up call for the Conservative party’. In the introduction he argued that “the Conservative party’s problem is its brand…the brand problem means that the most robust, coherent, principled and attractive Conservative policies will have no impact on the voters”.

Labour needs to ‘smell the coffee’ now and not wait for three election defeats. New polling shows the Labour party’s brand is in toxic territory. Ashcroft realised that policy is nothing without presentation and presentation is nothing without policy. Labour now has a problem with both.

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Joe Cox presents the Compass campaign to end legal loan sharking

04/08/2010, 03:30:05 PM

The world of high finance can often seem a remote place. A friend once told me that after the financial crash and subsequent fall out that they were frustrated that they couldn’t link the behaviour of capital to the lives of ordinary people. The reason why citizens groups and citizens organising is all the rage at the moment is because it does this very thing – it links the intangible and the remote to the immediate.

After the financial crisis Citizens UK began to hear stories about the increase in interest rates on money loans. More and more stories also emerged about doorstep and other high cost lending. High cost lenders were targeting housing estates with offers of immediate credit at very high prices. Once people took out these high cost loans their problems often become worse and they had to borrow more. (more…)

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