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Events:
Oct. 2008 Labour History
Conference in Essex
Jointly organised by Labour
Heritage and the Essex Country Labour Party.Saturday, 17th
October, 2009 at the Labour Hall, Collingwood Road,
Witham Essex 10.30am – 4pm
Registration free: £6.
For further information
and/or to register, please contact:
John Kotz on
john.kotz@tiscali.co.uk
Themes of conference will
be:
-
Tom Paine, author of
The Rights of Man
-
The Second Labour
Government 1929-1931: its genesis and achievements;
its catastrophic defeat in 1931 and the slow recovery;
comparison with today.
By train – direct train from
Liverpool Street to Witham, + 5 minutes walk to hall. By
car: Witham is just off the A.12
West London Labour History
conference
The
next West London event will be on Saturday 21st November
2009.
2 – 5pm
at Labour Party Offices, 367 Chiswick High Road, W4 4AG
Entrance: £4 (concessions £2).
Speakers to be confirmed
For
further information, please contact John Grigg, 020 8743
0189
Griggshampan1@ukonline.co.uk.
Past event reports
Conference on labour history in Essex 2008
The
joint Labour Heritage-Essex County Labour Party
Conference on Labour History was held at Witham Labour
Hall on Saturday 25th October 2008 and
chaired throughout by John Kotz, who welcomed everyone
at 11 am, briefly referring to the continued success of
these occasions. Over 50 people attended.
Robert Owen
Stan
Newens, chair of Labour Heritage, was the opening
speaker on the subject of Robert Owen, born on 14th
March, 1771, and the 150th anniversary of his
death was 17th November, 2008.
Stan
recalled that in 1958, the centenary of Owen’s death, he
had written an article on the pioneer co-operator, and
in 1971 had listened to Harold Wilson at a bicentenary
event, in memory of his birth.
Owen
began work with a London draper, Mr. Heptinstall, but
moved to an apprenticeship in Stamford, back to London
and then to Manchester. In Manchester, he set up a
textile venture with Ernest Jones. Here, he contributed
to literary and philosophical societies, meeting a
variety of intellectuals and gaining experience of
public speaking, while being involved in running a
succession of ever bigger cotton mills.
He then
came into contact with David Dale of New Lanark Mills,
near Glasgow, and eventually married his daughter. With
partners, he bought New Lanark Mills and introduced
model conditions. Workers’ houses were built, an
effective superannuation scheme was set up, and an
improved school was established for workers’ children.
This was in accordance with his dictum: “Man’s character
is made for him and not by him”. He believed workers
would change under different conditions. The best state
would be judged by its education system.
Owen
never shied away from appealing to those at the top,
presenting his ideas to Lord Liverpool, Lord Sidmouth
and the Archbishop of Canterbury and receiving visits at
New Lanark from royalty, including the Tsar of Russia.
Owen gave £1,000 to Joseph Lancaster’s British & Foreign
Schools Society, which was promoting the monitorial
system in schools, and would have given the same to
Andrew Bell’s National Society had they agreed to open
schools to pupils of every creed.
Before
1832 only one in forty men and no women had the vote and
Parliament was totally unrepresentative. However, Owen
co-operated with Sir Robert Peel the elder (father of
the future Prime Minister) to get the 1819 Factory Act
passed, restricting child labour in the factories –
although there were no inspectors to enforce it..
When
his ideas were finally rejected by the ruling classes,
Owen went to America and established a community, New
Harmony, in Indiana after purchasing land from a German
peasant community set up by George Rapp.
Meanwhile, however, co-operative experiments inspired by
Owen’s ideas multiplied in Britain, especially in
London. The first London Co-operative Society was
launched in October 1824 and the word ‘socialism’
originated in its publication The Co-operative
Magazine of November 1827.
Robert
Owen returned to Britain after New Harmony had failed
and his efforts to convince others – including the
Mexican leader Santa Anna – had proved unsuccessful.
Undaunted, he continued to organise and founded the
Grand National & Consolidated Trade Union based on
associations for each trade going down to parochial
lodges, which also failed. During this period, he was
in the forefront of the campaign in support of the
exiled Tolpuddle Martyrs.
He met
King Louis Philippe of France to try to influence him,
and promoted Queenswood Co-operative Community which was
dissolved in 1845. In later years he became interested
in spiritualism, but was still projecting his ideas to
within a fortnight of his death in 1858.
He saw
himself as ahead of his time, and his long-term
influence was enormous. Twelve of the Rochdale
Pioneers, who established the co-operative model which
swept the country, were Owenites. Karl Marx referred to
him at the inauguration of the First International in
1864. The trade unions and the working class movement
at home and abroad derived much from him. The huge debt
should be fully acknowledged and remembered at this the
150th anniversary of his death.
Votes for women
Mary
Davis, (Professor of History at London Metropolitan
University) then spoke on how the vote for women was won
and the significance of Sylvia Pankhurst and the East
London Federation of Suffragettes. From the outset the
Pankhursts were split on “class/gender” versus “just
gender” politics – Sylvia totally for the former,
Emmeline and Christobel for the latter.
After
1884, the third Reform Act had left a third of the male
population disenfranchised and the property
qualification would mean a much larger proportion of
women would be left without the vote even after
Emmeline’s goal had been achieved. Indeed this resulted
in Asquith and Lloyd George decrying the sum of the
proposals of the Women’s Social and Political Union as a
“ladies bill”. Moreover some members of the Social
Democratic Federation (Harry Quelch and Belford Bax)
were dogmatically opposed to any female suffrage. In
a “New Leader” article, Gertrude Tuckwell, honorary
secretary of the Women’s Trade Union League, pointed out
that women’s property vote would generally support the
then incumbent Tory Government.
Furthermore the WPSU lacked internal democracy leading
to a rift with the labour movement which, Sylvia
Pankhurst, a close friend of Keir Hardie, strongly
opposed. Sylvia objected to the coolness shown to the
Independent Labour Party by the WPSU and was dubious of
its “terrorist campaign” readily appreciating why
working class women could not afford to gaol, with the
resulting loss of job and source of income. The “Cat
and Mouse Act” with release into relaxing conditions
for recuperation was only for the “comfortably
unemployed.” Rather naively, she went to the East End,
where “toffs” were viewed with suspicion, as it was a
nearly homogeneous working class area. Sylvia was not
afraid to speak out against other locals on the left and
when George Lansbury resigned his seat, Bromley and Bow
in 1912 to fight a by-election on “votes for women”, she
described his actions as “rash and premature”.
She
was also a strong opponent of racism and when Moet
referred to black troops on the Rhine as the “black
scourge of Europe” in a”Herald” article, she vehemently
objected. Later she was a staunch supporter of Ethiopian
freedom (indeed later generations of the family are
still much involved with that country). Sylvia’s organ
of communication was the “Workers Dreadnought” which
counter-balanced “Britannia” which whilst having the
slogan “votes for women” was embarrassingly
nationalistic. Sylvia was eventually expelled from the
WPSU but, with an established base in the East End,
helped organise an Albert Hall rally to raise money for
the Dublin lockout victims and became a friend of
Connelly and Larkin.
Christobel
became one of seventeen candidates of the short-lived
and extremely reactionary Women’s Party, while Emmeline,
as viciously anti-socialist as ever became Tory
candidate for Whitechapel St George but died before the
1929 General Election. Sylvia was briefly in the
Communist Party, attended their first international
conference, corresponded with Lenin and continued with
progressive causes for the rest of her life.
The
NHS
After
an excellent and much-appreciated lunch the afternoon
commenced with John Macnicol, Visiting Professor of
Social Policy at the LSE, whose subject was the
establishment of the NHS in 1948 and sixty years of its
achievement.
In
Victorian times, doctors were wealthy men with wealthier
patients. There was public health legislation but
working people were reliant on friendly societies or
more limited sources. This was depicted by there being a
doctor for every 476 people in Hampstead, but for 4,568
in Bermondsey. The wealthy relieved their aches and
pains with a variety of, nowadays, questionable drugs
such that “Victorians were quite spectacular substance
abusers”. Cover for the non-wealthy was patchy and
inadequate – schemes had an income limit of £160 per
annum with no cover for dependents or self-employed and
black-coated workers could find themselves outside the
financial boundaries. In total nineteen million were
covered by health insurance , fifteen million were not
covered, with a further one million left outside.
The
Dawson and British Medical Association reports of the
1930s stated that the average GP income was £1,000 per
annum, but Harley Street incomes could be 100 guineas a
day – indeed charging travel at one guinea a mile, a
trip to attend 100 miles away could result in 300
guineas being paid for less than 24 hours work, nearly
one third of the GP’ s average income. Although there
were voluntary and local authority (ex-Poor Law)
hospitals there was far more deprivation and distress
than originally thought.
The
Tories opposed the 1946 NHS Bill line by line and clause
by clause, necessitating four readings. They especially
opposed emergency medical services.
Despite
common misconceptions Nye Bevan’s remarks that he
“stuffed their mouths with gold” was made ten years
later and not boastfully but ruefully, feeling that GPs
had been allowed too high a price. The NHS most
benefited old folk, women and children. No more did
people rummage through tin boxes at sales in search of
the nearest suitable pair of glasses; new spectacles
were, initially, free at the point of need. However
until this time the poor had generally not had to pay
taxes.
Over
the years many other changes have come about although
there has been no increase in the percentage of GDP
spent on the NHS (approximately 3.5%). New charges came
into use in the 1960-5 period, although the post-code
lottery remained. The trend over nearly two decades of
Tory rule had been to enforce monetarism, to push
through industrial legislation in an attempt to destroy
the unions followed by dismantling the welfare state.
Under New Labour more hospitals have been built with
more funds being made available, plus attempts to
reverse some of previous Tory cuts, but this has been
done with private-public partnerships, plus
privatisation of health care to foreign capitalists
encouraged by New Labour. Private practice has continued
in areas like dentistry. An enormous amount needs to be
done but the NHS is still very badly needed.
The
final talk was a shorter contribution by John Grigg,
Labour Heritage treasurer and former member of Hounslow
Council, on the background to the NHS. Beveridge’s
report was published in 1942. Three years later the BMA
was meeting in Tavistock Square when news arrived that
Beveridge had lost his Berwick seat and their incurable
immaturity burst forth as they cheered in a yobbish
fashion.
Not
all GPs were of this ilk. Indeed Dr Edith Summerskill –
a Labour MP for 23 years, said that it was a middle of
the night visit to deliver a baby under appalling
housing conditions that convinced her how necessary it
was to have a free health service. GPs felt that they
were being turned from small businessmen into civil
servants, and they greatly resented the state meddling
in their affairs in such a way that confidentiality
and freedom were at stake.
Based
on the average working class wage a GP visit cost 5% of
gross earnings. Rather than charge for a second call
some doctors had sufficient decency to leave gloves to
be collected later then check the patient’s progress
when returning to pick up “the forgotten gloves”. Later
opposition from doctors was centred on the basic salary
which the more irrational described as a “fascist
measure”. However after a brilliant speech and strategy
by Nye Bevan Tory opposition was weakened. 20,000
doctors signed up while 90% of the public joined and by
the year’s end this had become 97%.
Questions and a general discussion covering all four
talks followed plus a discussion on future activity in
Essex and the conference closed at 4.15 pm.
Report
by Bill Bolland
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West
London Labour History Day 2008
This
was held on Saturday 22nd November in the
Chiswick Labour Party Rooms and was attended by over 40
people.
John
Wheatley
The
first speaker was Stephen Schifferes who had studied the
history of Labour housing policy at Warwick University
and is working on a biography of John Wheatley.
John
Wheatley was a leader of the Red Clydesiders and became
Minister of Health in the first Labour Government. He
was principle architect of the 1924 Housing Act that saw
a massive programme of municipal housing at affordable
rents.
He was
born in Ireland in 1869 and migrated to Lanarkshire. His
father was a miner and John himself went down the pits
at the age of eleven. Getting out of the mines he sold
religious calendars door to door and later set up a
printing business.
John
was converted to the Labour Party by the poverty and
housing conditions that he saw and he joined the Party
in 1906. He had roots in the catholic community and was
also a member of the Catholic Socialist Society and the
Catholic Working Men’s Association.
When he
became a member of Lanarkshire County Council in 1912 he
argued that profits from tram fares should go to provide
cheap housing in Glasgow.
During
World War 1 housing conditions in Glasgow worsened as
workers flooded into to work in the munitions factories
needed accommodation. There was serious over-crowding.
With growing demand landlords took the opportunity to
raise rents and tenants unable to pay were evicted. The
Labour Party took up their cause campaigning against
poor housing and evictions. Some of those evicted were
war widows or wives of soldiers who ended up out on the
street with their children. Such was the feeling that
one of the slogans of the rent strike of 1915 was “Let’s
get rid of the huns at home” – meaning the landlords!
In 1915
Prime Minister Asquith introduced national rent controls
for the wartime years, but in the 1920s these controls
came to an end and rents soared by 40%. Clydeside
continued to be a centre of political protest, partly on
the rents issue. In the general election of 1918,
Wheatley campaigned for “homes fit for heroes” but he
lost his seat by 72 votes. In 1922 however he was
elected along with 11 other “Clydesiders” who went to
Parliament championing the cause of “Red Clydeside”.
John
Wheatley went on to become Minister of Health, also
responsible for housing in the first Labour Government
of 1924. He was concerned with building more houses of a
good standard (why couldn’t working class housing have
parlours?) and with keeping rents down. The success of
Wheatley’s housing policy was that 180,000 to 450,000
new houses were to be built in the five years after his
Housing Act had been passed. This posed the need for
control over the building industry to supply the bricks
and training of apprentices. Altogether 2 million
council houses were built in the inter-war years.
Wheatley became associated with the left-wing of the
Party after Labour was defeated after a short time in
office. He along with other Clydeside MPs supported the
Cook-Maxton Manifesto in opposition to the financial
orthodoxy increasingly adopted by Labour leaders such as
Ramsay Macdonald and Philip Snowdon. He died in 1930.
The
talk was followed by a lively discussion in which
members of the audience drew some of the lessons that we
can learn from John Wheatley’s housing policy to solve
the housing crisis of today and how current government
ministers should take that on board.
The
Putney Debates
The
second speaker of the day was Anne Polden, an Open
University tutor in history on the 1647 Putney debates
which took place during the English Civil War. For the
first time the issues of universal suffrage and the
control of Parliament over the King and Lords, were
raised.
Anne
gave an introduction to the Putney Debates and how they
arose during the course of the Civil War. The New Model
Army led by Oliver Cromwell and Thomas Rainsborough had
been the main force for overthrowing the monarchy.
Radical ideas through a group which came to be known as
the “Levellers” with a strong base amongst London
artisans, fluctuated widely throughout the Army.
Pamphlets were issued by the Levellers to influence
soldiers to support universal suffrage. The leaders of
Parliament however had the restoration of the King in
their sights. Religious radicalism also took hold as the
power of the established Church was challenged. Although
many of the Levellers could have been claimed to have
been agnostics. The issues for the Army was that of pay
– many were owed arrears of pay in 1647 and protection
from legal proceedings for treason.
The
Army had moved to Putney, which was in 1647, a village
on the outskirts of London. They were there to protect
Parliament from the Presbyterians who wanted an
agreement with the King. But they stayed away from
London itself so as not to be seen to be pressurising
the MPs.
The
Putney Debates took place in St Mary’s Church in October
1647. The rank and file of the Army debated the
“Agreement of the People”, a radical programme of rights
for all citizens. There was opposition though from those
who assumed that universal suffrage and election of all
MPs would mean a re-distribution of property. Those in
support opposed this scare-mongering – after all they
all obeyed God’s law that “thou shalt not steal!”
However historical events were against the Levellers
and their supporters in the Army, and they suffered a
military defeat at Burford, Oxfordshire in 1649.
There
was a discussion on how far the tradition of the
Levellers affected future generations of radicals, such
as the Chartists who were to call for universal suffrage
almost two hundred years later. Evidence was produced
that radical societies in some 18th century
English towns such as Norwich, made references to the
Levellers but more were made to the Jacobins across the
Channel in France. The term “Leveller” was to be used
negatively by the ruling class following the restoration
of the Monarchy and this revolutionary tradition in
English history was allowed to be buried for many years.
Twickenham elections and by-elections 1929-1935
The
third speaker of the afternoon was John Grigg from
Labour Heritage and a former Hounslow councillor. He
spoke on the theme of elections and by-elections in
Twickenham between 1929 and 1935, of which there were
six. The Twickenham constituency was formed in 1918
covering Twickenham, Isleworth, Hounslow and Heston.
Formerly it had been part of the Brentford Division.
Although the fortunes of the Labour Party fluctuated
during the time of these elections, it never returned a
Labour MP. There was however a Labour council for a
short while in Twickenham after 1945.
In 1929
the Conservative candidate was William Joynson-Hicks,
known as Jix. He had been Home Secretary between 1924
and 1929 and had adopted a hard line during the 1926
General Strike. He had also cracked down on nightclubs
and “other aspects of the roaring twenties”.
The
Labour candidate was Tom Mason. He had commenced his
political career as a Liberal but came to join the
Labour Party in Hounslow where he was elected President
of the Party and stood for the council unsuccessfully on
three occasions. He had a flair for organisation.
One of
the highlights of the 1929 campaign in Twickenham was a
visit from AJ Cook, the miners’ leader. He came to
Twickenham, probably to campaign against Joynson-Hicks
who had been so confrontational during the 1926 strike.
Scores of meetings held by both sides were reported in
the Middlesex Chronicle. Tom Mason held 25 meetings in
10 days. There was still a carnival like atmosphere
about elections in those days. For instance, the Labour
Party organised a march from Hounslow to Isleworth and a
flotilla of boats displaying slogans from Isleworth to
Eel Pie Island. The climax was election day when
thousands gathered in Treaty Road to hear the result.
Tom campaigned against the record of the Tory Government
on unemployment and also on slum clearance. The
government’s slum clearance scheme, he said, had only
affected 30,000 people. Houses which had been built, had
been as a result of the Wheatley Housing Act of 1924.
Although Labour speakers called for socialism to be
achieved by gradual means, the Tories accused them of
wanting to start a revolution, as in Russia.
“Jix”
claimed that living standards were going up, as seen by
increasingly car ownership and the number of letters
being posted! He was a supporter of Protection to guard
British industry – Labour and the Liberals supported
free trade as they claimed import duties would increase
the cost of living. Lord Beaverbrook was a champion of
“empire free trade” – free trade within the British
Empire. The Conservatives also wanted to reduce income
tax and return to the gold standard. Labour campaigned
for nationalisation of the mines, raising of the school
leaving age, slum clearance, a housing programme to be
financed by death duties and raising income tax.
On the
night of the election a large crowd gathered in Treaty
Road, Hounslow, singing rival party songs such as
“Solidarity forever”. At the end of the evening they
sang “Sonny boy” and “Tipperary”.
Although the Tory candidate held the seat, his majority
was reduced from 11,000 to 6,000 and Labour formed a
minority government.
“Sir
John could not run a tea shop!”
Joynson-Hicks
however was soon to elevated to the peerage and became
Lord Brentford. This necessitated a by-election two
months later, in August 1929, Tom Mason again stood for
Labour. Sir John Ferguson was selected by the local Tory
Party and he became a strong supporter of Lord
Beaverbrook’s policy of Empire Free Trade. This policy
was not popular as taxing food from the US and Argentina
would increase prices. Dominions such as Australia
already had their own tariff policies. Sir John claimed
that as a businessman he was fit to run the country but
Tom Mason pointed out that as chairman of Lipton Ltd., a
tea importing company, he had been responsible for
losses. “Sir John could not run a tea shop” said Mason!
Because
of his support for Empire Free Trade the Conservative
Party withdrew support from its candidate. Because of
this and as it was a by-election many Labour MPs came to
Twickenham to support the Labour candidate. The issue of
trade with Russia was raised and it was pointed out by
George Lansbury that the Co-operative Wholesale Society
had been doing millions of pounds of trade with Russia
for ten years and the Russians had always paid up on
time.
So it
was a high profile campaign and both sides brought in
many cars to take supporters to the polls. In Isleworth
children were organised with red flags, rosettes and
posters with photos of Tom Mason. Five thousand people
crowded Treaty Road to await the result, Songs were sung
and there was occasional rough play but the best of
order was kept by the police. Sadly Sir John Ferguson
the Tory candidate scraped home by 500 votes. There were
boos and cheers from the crowd such that the speeches of
the candidates could not be heard.
Labour
had formed a minority government in June 1929. Within
months came the Wall Street crash and by Spring 1930
unemployment had risen by 500,000 and by July 1931 over
2,700,000 were unemployed. This was happening under a
government which had promised to cut unemployment and
not much there was they could do about it with a world
slump gathering pace. There was a run on sterling and
MacDonald put forward a package of cuts to cover the
budget deficit – including cutting unemployment benefit
and salaries of civil servants and teachers.
MacDonald anticipated that he would have difficulty in
getting this through the Labour Cabinet and warned the
King, Liberals and Conservatives that he might have to
resign. The Conservatives and Liberals had told the King
that they would back MacDonald continuing as Prime
Minister so that when the Labour Cabinet turned down the
proposals, MacDonald’s offer to the King to resign was
turned down. The King, MacDonald, and the opposition
leaders met on August 24th and in August 1931
a National Government was formed with MacDonald as Prime
Minister and Baldwin as his deputy. But the run on
sterling continued and in September Britain came off the
Gold Standard. A general election was called for
October.
National Government
In the
Twickenham constituency Tom Mason had stepped down as
Labour candidate and Percy Holman was selected. Percy
Holman had also started his political life in the
Liberal Party, joining the Hornsey Young Liberals in
1907. He had drifted into the Labour Party through the
Co-operative Party in Teddington in 1927. He was a paper
merchant and director of three companies engaging in
printing and stationary.
During
the campaign Percy Holman condemned the policies of the
National Government, saying that it was madness to cut
salaries and unemployment benefit during a recession.
The cure would be to raise the standard of living of
workers so they could consume more. He called for free
trade and a re-organisation of industry and agriculture
so that products and proceeds benefited the community
instead of profiteers. He called for an eight hour day.
It was a dirty campaign with the Tories (representing
the National Government) claiming that Labour would
confiscate Post Office Savings and would lead to “ruin,
starvation and revolution”. Ferguson also attacked the
Co-op saying that it had an unfair advantage over other
shopkeepers. As it happened, polling day coincided with
the Co-op dividend withdrawal and as the members left
the shops they were handed leaflets seeking them to
support Holman, the Co-op candidate to “safeguard your
dividend”.
There
was a huge swing against Labour and they only won 46
seats. In Twickenham the Conservatives won by over
25,000 votes.
Within
a year Sir John Ferguson died of a heart attack and
another by-election was called.
Labour regains ground
In the
by-election of September 1932 Percy Holman was opposed
by H.R.Murray-Philipson, another supporter of Empire
Free Trade. During the campaign this issue was pushed to
the fore and the Co-op also was attacked by the
Conservatives.
Holman
called for a shorter working week to cut unemployment.
George Lansbury and Clement Attlee came down to speak at
public meetings, attended by hundreds of people in
support of the Labour candidate. The Conservative
majority from the General Election was cut down to 5,500
from 25,000 and a crowd of 1,500 sang the Red Flag in
Treaty Road when the result was announced.
Less
than two years after being elected Murray-Philipson died
and the local Conservatives came up with another Empire
Free Trader called Brigadier-General A.C.Critchley.
However by now the issue was overshadowed by foreign
policy. Holman advocated support for the League of
Nations and Critchley called for re-armament. Herbert
Morrison came down to support Percy Holman. He called
for the planning of natural wealth for the good of the
people, not private gain. Critchley won by 5,500 votes,
which he claimed vindicated the policies of the
government on defence, tariffs and the “menace of the
Co-op”.
1935
General Election
In
November 1935 there was a General Election and this time
the main issue was Abyssinia which was being attacked by
Italy. Holman again stood as the Labour candidate and
the Tories selected Edward Keeling. Holman was a staunch
defendant of disarmament whilst Keeling backed sanctions
against Italy and building up armed forces to deal with
Germany and Italy. In defence of Labour’s policy Holman
said that Britain was responsible for one third of the
world’s arms trade and without it Abyssinia would not
have been attacked.
The
result was not good for Labour. The results of the
previous by-elections had shown that Labour was quickly
recovering from the National Government debacle even in
Conservative seats such as Twickenham. In the face of
the threat of war however the electorate backed the
government and Keeling won by 37,635 votes to Holman’s
22,823, a majority of 14,812. Compared to the previous
general election however the Conservative vote fell by
1,500, Labour’s rose by 9,000 and there was a 12% swing
to Labour. In his speech to Labour supporters, Holman
said that they had been beaten again but were steadily
mounting. Already a considerable number of Labour gains
had been announced up and down the country and in
another few years would win Twickenham! He urged his
workers not to be downhearted by the result.
“Every
convert we make to socialism is a convert for life, and
every step of progress we make …is a foundation stone
for socialism. …Our growth has been little short of a
miracle…if you call on me again you can rely on me to be
always willing to carry the flag of socialism
faithfully.”
The
workers joined in singing “For he’s a jolly good fellow”
and cheered.
During the meeting chair of Labour Heritage Stan Newens
made an appeal for those not already members to join,
and to work to safeguard labour movement archives.
Dave
Welsh appealed for help for a “Britain at work “oral
history project.
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