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The Starmer project and the SDP: back to the 1980s
What is the Labour leader up to? It is not clear from his recent vague pronouncements — could the real goal not be winning an election, but creating the 1981 split in reverse, with the left forced into a rival party, asks KEITH FLETT
The first Social Democratic Party conference at the City Hall Perth in October 1981
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STILL MARCHING: A May Day demo makes its way through London, 1973
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Features / 14 April 2025
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From bemoaning London’s ‘cockneys’ invading seaside towns to negotiating holiday rents, the founders of scientific socialism maintained a wry detachment from Victorian Easter customs while using the break for health and politics, writes KEITH FLETT
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Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Chancellor of the Exchequer
Features / 17 March 2025
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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
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KEITH FLETT offers some historical context to the election campaign’s final period
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer with former Conservative MP N
Features / 14 May 2024
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Normally in British politics, leftwingers defect right. Under Blair and now Starmer however, this trend seems to reverse, calling into question the ‘broad church’ that welcomes Tories and excludes socialists, writes KEITH FLETT