Spokesman Books

Herald Angels Bill Hagerty The Miracle of Fleet Street: the Story of the Daily Herald , by George Lansbury (Labour Publishing Company, 1925, price unknown; republished by Spokesman Books, 20009, pp168, £15.00) This is not exactly the whole story of what, in the early 1930s, was to become Britain's biggest-selling daily newspaper. Those wishing to learn about the ferocious pre-Second World War circulation battles, or the anguished slide that saw the paper metamorphose into the short-lived IPC Sun before being given garish new clothes and soaring away under the control of fledgling emperor Rupert Murdoch, must look elsewhere. Having been born in 1911 as a daily strike-bulletin when London print Unions came out for a 48-hour working week, and resurrected the following year with capital of around £300 as a co-operative Labour venture, the Herald had been publishing consistently for only 13 years when Labour leader-to-be Lansbury recounted its trials and tribulations — there were many —...

Global Auction of Public Assets Dexter Whitfield £18.00 Dexter Whitfield has been one of the most well-informed and effective critics of the whole programme of privatisation of Britain's public services, begun by Margaret Thatcher and continued by New Labour. He is the director of the European Services Strategy Unit, continuing the work of the Centre for Public Services, which he founded in 1973, and has more recently sought to spread his critique worldwide, as more and more countries have begun to move their social infrastructure from a public service into private profit-making businesses. This new book is the result of this extension of his interest. It is, as were his earlier books on the attack on UK public services, both thoroughly researched and immaculately presented. What began as a specifically British exercise by Thatcher to strengthen the power of capital in relation to labour has been taken up by giant corporations of capital operating in both the developed and developi...

Spokesman 107 Edited by Ken Coates 'The Security Service was officially launched in 1909 with a staff of two, who were supposed to defend the realm against Germany. Later they made a painless adjustment and began to defend it against Russia. As the two engaged ever larger numbers of accomplices it became clear that the realm which they defended consisted of ever smaller tracts of establishment England, setting its bounds somewhat short of the area occupied by the masses of the British common people … … What can be done to clip the wings of all these spooks? Well, first of all, as far as the junior members of the team are concerned, substantial cuts can be made in their budgets. What precisely is all this intrigue for? How is it to be justified? It should surely be possible to control the expenditures of this kind of service in such a way as to reduce them to a minimum. Then we shall be told that we need an intelligence service to apprehend terrorists. There are, unfortunately, nume...

Tribune - 8th January 2010 Bill Brand: The Screenplays by Trevor Griffiths Spokesman Books, £18 "Trevor Griffiths is best known for stage plays such as Thatcher’s Children , Oi for England and the recently revived Comedians , as well as his screenplays for such films as Reds and Fatherland . But 30-odd years ago he wrote Bill Brand , an ambitious television series broadcast on ITV at peak time – 9pm – in 1976. It starred Jack Shepherd as an idealistic young left-wing MP who finds himself at odds with the pragmatists in a party which wants to hang on to power. Bill Brand showed, once again, the ability of this talented political playwright to dramatise the ideological conflicts of the left during those tumultuous years. Here, in all their glory, are his original scripts." Keith Richmond Availble to BUY NOW from Spokesman Books

This latest volume in the Trevor Griffiths series contains all eleven episodes of the celebrated 1976 Thames TV series Bill Brand , which was the fictional account of a young left-wing Labour MP entering Parliament for the first time and attempting to influence the policies of his largely right-wing Labour government. The series was conceived on election night in 1974, written and produced over the following two years and transmitted in 1976. This was a time of great political and industrial unrest in Britain; it produced the first minority government (under Harold Wilson) since 1931, and Bill Brand was watched with extreme interest by both the political classes and the wider population. At times it seemed almost uncannily prophetic; and many of the issues it dealt with remain of great contemporary relevance. The series starred Jack Shepherd as Bill Brand, Arthur Lowe as the Prime Minister, Alan Badel, Peter Howell, Lynne Farleigh, Cherie Lunghi and many other distinguished actors. Bi...

On 23 July 2002, the Prime Minister called a high-level meeting about Iraq. It took place in Downing Street. The minute taker noted that his record was "extremely sensitive". It does indeed contain confidential information about preparations for war on Iraq. Blair's comments are recorded, as are those of the Chief of Defence Staff, Sir Michael Boyce, among others. On 4 December 2009, Boyce appeared before the Iraq Inquiry, and was rather candid about the frustrations of trying to prepare a major military campaign without being able to tell his head of logistics. (Defence Secretary Hoon had told him not to.) Boyce was not asked about his precise comments about military options and critical requirements for the US (basing in Diego Garcia and Cyprus), as recorded in the memo of the meeting of 23 July '02. Next week, John Scarlett appears before the Inquiry. He had opened the discussion in Downing Street with an account of intelligence and the latest Joint Intelligence Co...

The Dodgiest Dossier Essential reading as the Chilcot Inquiry into the war on Iraq begins its public hearings in London, 24 November. These key secret documents include the notorious Downing Street Memo of July 2002, which recorded the candid assessment of the head of MI6, in the presence of Prime Minister Blair, that in the United States 'the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy'. The documents were leaked in 2005, during the run-up to the General Election of that year. Their authors are amongst the first witnesses to be called by the Inquiry. A useful and informative independent commentary on the Iraq Inquiry is available online ( www.iraqinquirydigest.org ). BUY NOW Price £4.00 - 80 pages