Once the bustling heart of Christian pilgrimage, Bethlehem now faces shuttered hotels, empty streets and a shrinking Christian community, while Israel’s assault on Gaza and the tightening grip of occupation destroy hopes of peace at the birthplace of Christ, writes Father GEOFF BOTTOMS
The loss of council housing is creating a rural dystopia
Decades of right to buy have eroded the social balance of our countryside — and now holiday lets and second home owners from the cities are compounding the crisis, writes DAVE BANGS
Houses on St Anne's council estate in Bristol, dating from the 1920's, which now has a mixture of council and privately owned homes
After years hidden away, Oldham’s memorial to six local volunteers who died fighting fascism in the Spanish civil war has been restored to public view, marking both a victory for campaigners and a renewed tribute to the town’s proud International Brigade heritage, says ROB HARGREAVES
The June 2025 attacks on Iran have heightened the risk of a wider war, exposed the fiction of a rules-based international order and left ordinary Iranians trapped between external aggression and internal repression, says the Committee for Defence of Iranian People’s Rights
While pretending to seek peace, Europe is heading toward a collision course with Russia – using security guarantees, troop deployments, expropriation and censorship as tools, writes SEVIM DAGDELEN
A WWI hero, renowned ornithologist, medical doctor, trade union organiser and founder member of the Communist Party of Great Britain all rolled in one. MAT COWARD tells the story of a life so improbable it was once dismissed as fiction
The long-term effects of chemical weapons such as Agent Orange mean that the impact of war lasts well beyond a ceasefire
IT IS the council housing that can leave the strongest impression in the villages, small towns and hamlets of our countryside.
Still today, it is the well-built council family houses, mostly semis or small terraces, with their generous garden and community spaces, often paying homage in their design to local building traditions, that seem most practical and homely.
With their old privet hedges, mini-greens and trees often older than the houses, they are as much part of our countryside as old churches, pubs and timber-framed cottages.
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Building is the solution for much of our housing crisis – and will also help to address poverty, ill health, and even anti-social behaviour and alienation, writes KENNY MacASKILL
CAROL WILCOX argues for the proper implementation of the land value tax, which could see unused plots sold off and landlords priced out of landlordism, potentially resolving the housing and planning crises
Our housing crisis isn’t an accident – it’s class war, trapping millions in poverty while landlords and billionaires profit. To solve it, we need comprehensive transformation, not mere tokenistic reform, writes BECK ROBERTSON
Above-inflation rent increases will push council tenants deeper into poverty while failing to address the housing crisis — and it won’t really raise any money, as council rent arrears are doubling across the country, argues MARTIN WICKS