Disabled people: Labour manifesto offers little
Labour’s general election manifesto offers little more than vague mentions to disabled people, and drops many of the party’s specific pledges.
Issues and campaigns: Labour Party
A bourgeois workers’ party, Lenin called it.
Video: Neurodiversity – a left-wing perspective
Neurodiversity – a left-wing perspective On Monday 25 March, Janine spoke at an online open meeting hosted by Lewes Labour party members, setting out a left-wing perspective on neurodiversity. You can watch a video of the talk, and the ensuing … Read more
Speaking about Neurodiversity at Lewes Labour online open meeting
Janine will be speaking about neurodiversity at March’s ‘open meeting’ organised by Lewes Labour activists. ‘Different people have different brain wiring. Those with a minority brain wiring – such as dyslexic, autistic and dyspraxic people – face discrimination at work … Read more
Effluenza
Our public sewage industry was sold to private bidders Who don’t dispose of putrid waste but dump it in the rivers They take responsibility and flush it down the loo For building up the affluent builds effluence up too The … Read more
Speaking for Labour to adopt neurodiversity policy
The Labour Party’s 2021 National Policy Forum report contained no mention of neurodiversity, despite a detailed and popular submission from Neurodivergent Labour to the Forum. So Janine proposed to Conference that it ‘refer back’ that section of the report so that … Read more
Calling for Labour to adopt policy on neurodiversity
At 2021 Labour Party conference, I moved a ‘reference back’ of the National Policy Forum report, due to its failure to include any policy on neurodiversity, despite a detailed submission being made to the policy forum process. This is what … Read more
Asking Sadiq Khan to improve cleaners’ pay and conditions
At Labour party conference, I spoke in the debate about local government, shortly after London Mayor Sadiq Khan had spoken. This is the second part of what I said. “I’ve worked on London Underground stations for nearly 25 years, and … Read more
Speaking at NEU Disabled Members’ Conference
Janine will speak as part of a panel on Realising Disability Equality, specifically about links to the Labour Party and to DPOs (Disabled People’s Organisations) such as DPAC (Disabled People Against the Cuts), Inclusion London and ROFA (Reclaiming our Futures Alliance). … Read more
Hancock’s Last Hour
A classic of Great British humour Slapstick, slap-and-tickle, caught on candid camera And everyone likes to see the bad guy get his comeuppance, don’t they? But there is something of the gangster genre about it too where Al Capone is … Read more
Poplar’s rates victory: Ten key points
One hundred years ago, a big movement grew in the east London borough of Poplar, headed by thirty councillors who went to prison rather than levy extortionate rates or cut services to the working-class population that elected them. ‘Poplarism’ won. … Read more
‘Something like a Miracle’: Labour, Poplar and Local Government after WW1
How did Labour win big in the local elections after the First World War, and why did this lead to the rates crisis in Poplar in 1921? About this Event Before 1919 Labour had but a toe-hold in local government … Read more
Favourite Things (Lewes Remix)
Frost-polished gardens and cold hands in mittens Cute, cobbled alleyways, steep, narrow twittens Playgrounds with climbing frames, ropewalks and swings – Lewes is full of my favourite things A walk up the Down to see windmills and horses Vegan pub … Read more
Speaking about the Poplar Rates Rebellion
Janine gave this illustrated online talk about the Poplar Rates Rebellion for the TUC Tolpuddle Radical History School on 12 January 2021.
Clerihew: Nadia Whittome
Nadia Whittome Knows how to hit ’em When the leader’s a drip She’s defying the whip
Video: Labour Party Autism / Neurodiversity Manifesto
Janine explains the need for, and the content of, the Labour Party Autism and Neurodiversity Manifesto.
Clerihew Times Two: Herbert Morrison / Peter Mandelson
Herbert Morrison was moderate and worrisome He had an appropriate grandson: Peter Mandelson Peter Mandelson could not get a handle on The passionate, radical, principled and quarrelsome: rather like his grandfather, Herbert Morrison
CoronaVerses at Stay Home For Labour
Janine talks about the CoronaVerses: poems from the pandemic anthology, and performs a couple of poems, at this edition of the weekly Stay Home For Labour talk, comedy and politics event. Details here.
Speaking in Support of Tube Cleaners
Today at TUC Women’s conference, PCS moved a motion congratulating their members at BEIS for successful strike action, and drawing attention to the appalling conditions that outsouced workers, many of them women, face. I made the following contribution to the … Read more
Nadia Whittome MP’s Maiden Speech
I made Nadia Whittome’s maiden Commons speech into a poem. Here it is: “I’m here through solidarity and hard work in my town I want to say to Nottingham: ‘I will not let you down’ I’ll represent this burning earth … Read more
Make Labour Councils Centres of Resistance
In the cacophony of post mortems of Labour’s defeat, the role of Labour councils is being overlooked or at least understated. I think that a significant contributor to the erosion of Labour’s base has been councils which cut services, do … Read more