Fownhope’s Heart of Oak Society traces its roots to the age of friendly societies, when communities provided their own safety net. Its anniversary celebrations reveal a tradition still very much alive, says MARK SEDDON
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Ex-Tory minister crosses the bridge to lobby for shady Santander bank
George Bridges’ career highlights why the Tories will never challenge the City, writes SOLOMON HUGHES
ANGUS REID explains the significance of Cuba’s egalitarian in letter and spirit Family Code and the pertinent lessons it holds for democracies anywhere in the world
Special report by PEOPLE’S WORLD
NICK WRIGHT considers how the isolation of Israel and a new film on the controversial Italian communist leader are creating new reference points for Italy’s left
CARLOS MARTINEZ says Cuba’s achievements in the face of a criminal blockade are startling, but the island’s future if the United States succeeds in crushing it looks bleak
AMNON BROWNFIELD STEIN reports that far-right MPs who mobbed the event organised by Hadash may have helped raise awareness of the brutality of the Israeli right
THERESA MAY has made some noises about the hurt caused by the banks, but her government is still too close to the City to do anything about it.
They are so close to the banks that one of May’s ministers — one of the ministers in charge of Brexit, no less — came into government as a servant of a Spanish banker. He has left government to serve the same banker, almost without comment.
In her “social justice” speech at the recent Tory conference, May agonised about how “the effects of the financial crisis — nearly a decade of low growth, stagnating wages and pay restraint — linger.”
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Martin Taylor, the hedge-fund multimillionaire who has poured millions into pushing Labour rightwards, helped finance Lucy Powell’s supposedly dissenting campaign — suggesting her victory was not the ‘soft-left’ rebellion some have claimed, says SOLOMON HUGHES
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