Scottish Labour's leaders cannot keep blaming Westminster for the collapse at the ballot box, says VINCE MILLS
DECEMBER is rarely a time for big protests. The weather is poor and the pressures of a commercial festival are considerable, even more so in another year with Covid concerns.
Yet traditionally Christmas and new year have been times of revolt. When most worked on the land there was little that could be done in the few hours of daylight at this time of year. There was however plenty of time for festivities and revolt.
It was a time of the election of lords of misrule (these were mainly men although in France women also took the role).
It’s not just the Starmer regime: the workers of Britain have always faced legal affronts on their right to assemble and dissent, and the Labour Party especially has meddled with our freedoms from its earliest days, writes KEITH FLETT
Who you ask and how you ask matter, as does why you are asking — the history of opinion polls shows they are as much about creating opinions as they are about recording them, writes socialist historian KEITH FLETT
The government cracking down on something it can’t comprehend and doesn’t want to engage with is a repeating pattern of history, says KEITH FLETT
KEITH FLETT traces how the ‘world’s most successful political party’ has imploded since Thatcher’s fall, from nine leaders in 30 years to losing all 16 English councils, with Reform UK symbolically capturing Peel’s birthplace, Tamworth — but the beast is not dead yet



