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

THE deep institutional and political crisis gripping our country introduces — for the parents of the new political generation — a sensation similar to that experienced by the veterans of the defeated Chartist movement who saw in the late 19th century socialist and trade union renaissance their youthful dreams given new life.
The socialist song “England Arise, the long, long night is over” gave one voice to this reawakening. In Wales and Scotland the same sentiments found a distinctive national expression as British imperial power began to feel the competition from its continental and North American rivals and the stirrings of colonial revolt.
Today, as then, the constant recomposition of capital continually transforms the world of work and the social and political forces that express its contradictions. This proceeds in secret, unseen, the changes barely noticed until a slow accretion of these contradictions burst forth.

Holding office in local government is a poisoned chalice for a party that bases its electoral appeal around issues where it has no power whatsoever, argues NICK WRIGHT

From Gaza complicity to welfare cuts chaos, Starmer’s baggage accumulates, and voters will indeed find ‘somewhere else’ to go — to the Greens, nationalists, Lib Dems, Reform UK or a new, working-class left party, writes NICK WRIGHT

There is no doubt that Trump’s regime is a right-wing one, but the clash between the state apparatus and the national and local government is a good example of what any future left-wing formation will face here in Britain, writes NICK WRIGHT

European Central Bank chief Christine Lagarde sees Trump’s many disruptions as an opportunity to challenge the dollar’s ‘exorbitant privilege’ — but greater Euro assertiveness will also mean greater warmongering and militarism, warns NICK WRIGHT