There have been penalties for those who looked the other way when Epstein was convicted of child sex offences and decided to maintain relationships with the financier — but not for the British ambassador to Washington, reveals SOLOMON HUGHES
At 250 the Paradox of Robert Owen Continues
NICK MATTHEWS reflects on the enduring legacy of one of our most influential early socialists
PRECURSOR: Robert Owen Memorial Museum, Newtown; (left) Owen’s portrait by William Henry Brooke, 1834
Labour’s new Treasury unit will ‘challenge unnecessary regulation’ by forcing nominally independent bodies like Ofwat to bend to business demands — exactly what Iain Anderson’s corporate clients wanted, writes SOLOMON HUGHES
DR DYLAN MURPHY looks at a Big Brother Watch report which exposes the government as an enabler of DWP secret spying on benefit claimants
The EU faces a critical choice: will it remain in the shadow of an increasingly unreliable US ally, or will it forge its own path in a multilateral world where co-operation with China is essential, asks MARC VANDEPITTE as leaders meet for the EU-China Summit
A lot of discussion about how the left should currently organise – including debate on whether the Green Party is a useful vehicle for advance – runs the risk of refusing to engage with or learn from the reasons the left was defeated previously, argues KEVIN OVENDEN
For Egypt trade trumps the Israeli genocide of the Palestinians, but how long can the country’s ‘misleaders’ – and others in the region – continue their indifference against the popular will of their own people, asks ROGER McKENZIE
“THE paradox of Robert Owen has continuing fascination. Why has he remained a central figure of the English socialist tradition even though Owenite socialist institutions failed, and his version of socialism was already outmoded before his death?
How was it that Friedrich Engels could condemn Owen’s socialism as utopian and yet concede that “‘every social movement, every real advance on behalf of workers links itself to the name of Robert Owen’?”
John Harrison contributed this to a collection of essays celebrating the 200th anniversary of Owens birth in 1971.
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NICK MATTHEWS welcomes the return of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s music to the repertoire of this years’ Three Choirs Festival
From sexual innuendo about Blackpool Rock to Bob Dylan’s ‘God-almighty world,’ the corporation’s classist moral custodianship of pop music has created a roll call of censored artists anyone would feel honoured to join, writes NICK MATTHEWS
NICK MATTHEWS previews a landmark book launch taking place in Leicester next weekend
As new wind, solar and nuclear capacity have displaced coal generation, China has been able to drastically lower its CO2 emissions even as demand for power has increased — the world must take note and get ready to follow, writes NICK MATTHEWS
