Skip to main content
Gifts from The Morning Star
Does the left benefit from crises in the ruling class?
From the corn laws to the Irish question, from universal suffrage to Brexit, huge splits inevitably emerge in the Establishment — but these don’t automatically benefit the masses, explains KEITH FLETT
PM Robert Peel (1788–1850) and a poster celebrating the repeal of the hated corn laws

THE British ruling class is in a period of crisis which dates back at least to the June 2016 Brexit vote.

Some sections of capital want Britain to lead a race to the bottom in terms of the exploitation of workers, outside of the EU.

Other sections would prefer to be part of an EU, if not a global market, where the framework of profit and exploitation is regulated to prevent advantage to any specific area of business.

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
More from this author
GUILTY OF POVERTY: Dinner time in St Pancras Workhouse, London, October 2011 / Pic: Unknown/CC
Features / 26 July 2025
26 July 2025

KEITH FLETT looks at the long history of coercion in British employment laws

Police officers watch as people take part in a national march for Palestine on Whitehall in central London, January 18, 2025
Features / 10 July 2025
10 July 2025

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

Prime Minister Tony Blair welcomes American President George W Bush to the first meeting of the G8 Summit at the Gleneagles Hotel in Scotland, July 7, 2005
Features / 26 June 2025
26 June 2025

While Hardie, MacDonald and Wilson faced down war pressure from their own Establishment, today’s leadership appears to have forgotten that opposing imperial adventures has historically defined Labour’s moral authority, writes KEITH FLETT

Former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn speaking at the People's Assembly Against Austerity protest in central London, June 7, 2025
Labour’s loss / 12 June 2025
12 June 2025

10 years ago this month, Corbyn saved Labour from its right-wing problem, and then the party machine turned on him. But all is not lost yet for the left, says KEITH FLETT

Similar stories
Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch at their local election campaign launch at The Curzon Centre in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire, March 20, 2025
Features / 14 May 2025
14 May 2025

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

Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Chancellor of the Exchequer
Features / 17 March 2025
17 March 2025
Starmer’s slash-and-burn approach to disability benefits represents a fundamental break with Labour’s founding mission to challenge the idle rich rather than punish the vulnerable poor, argues KEITH FLETT
Leaders of the Labour Representation Committee in 1906. From
Features / 4 March 2025
4 March 2025
The formation of the Labour Representation Committee in 1900 marked the beginning of interconnected and contested strategies — parliamentary and industrial — seeking ways to advance working-class interests, writes KEITH FLETT

A statue of former British prime minister Sir Robert Peel i
Features / 17 September 2024
17 September 2024
KEITH FLETT draws parallels with the 1834 Tory crisis, noting the absence of modern-day Robert Peel among the leadership contenders capable of reinventing the party for a new era