Robert Noonan, an Irish housepainter who wrote a single book in his life under the surname Tressell, died from tuberculosis, that old codeword for poverty, in 1911. His single written work, The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists, stayed unpublished until his daughter Kathleen found a publisher for some of the material in 1914…

The weekend saw the removal of a statue of a slave trader in Bristol by Black Lives Matter protestors. Like so much of social change that is caused by social movements, this particular statue finally fell to direct action after years of discussion and failed petitions. …

Something went viral last week. It was a message from an unknown everyman or woman who felt compelled to speak for Britain. It started ‘A message to all our Negative UK Press…’ “…We do not want or need blame. We do not want constant criticism of our government who are…

The respected historian Eric Hobsbawm, in an attempt to understand the character of the last two centuries, made two observations that defined his work. First, there was a ‘long nineteenth century’ a 125 year period of relative stability from the French Revolution in 1789 until the First World War in…

“The fact of the matter is, millions of people have been killed in vicious circumstances on a regular basis throughout history…They went to the Congo in the late 19th century and decimated it… “[the Holocaust was] almost a normal event…just another fuckery in human history.” These were the words of…

The twenty-year-old Northern Ireland peace deal dealt decisively with the issue of identity — the same issue now at the heart of Brexit “It’s not about how long it takes a lorry to cross a border,” pleaded Jonathan Powell, Tony Blair’s former chief of staff, on Newsnight recently, “The issue…

Are you a British voter? Have you heard that Jeremy Corbyn is a Marxist but unsure what that means? If yes then it might be worth making up your mind so you can vote on 12th December in good faith. To get to the bottom of this we must understand…

“Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way The time is gone, the song is over, Thought I’d something more to say.” Pink Floyd, 1973 The Conservative Party is the most successful political party in modern history. They are considered by many, and nearly all within it, to be…

In his book ‘Heroic Failure: Brexit And The Politics of Pain’, Fintan O’ Toole concludes that the UK: “cannot be governed without radical social and constitutional change.’ and that, ‘[the]model of the British state is sanctified by the vestiges of explicitly pre-democratic forms of rule — the monarchy and the…