The Richer, The Poorer, by Stewart Lansley

Lobster Issue 86 (2023)

[PDF file]: […] pro-inequality model of political economy, dysfunctional as it has been, proved remarkably resilient.’ How and why has this happened in the 21st century under Labour, Coalition and Conservative governments? Lansley says the key explanation for Britain’s high poverty rate lies in profound economic and social shifts. These include the speed of industrial change, the […]

Mr Gibbs and Mr Goering

Lobster Issue 92 (2026)

[PDF file]: […] might resolve matters, he interviewed the leaders of each of the UK’s major political parties together with their deputies and foreign policy spokesmen. All of them ( Conservative, Liberal National, Liberal and Labour) were open to the idea of peace talks; but, equally, all of them agreed that Hitler was untrustworthy and that there […]

The view from the bridge

Lobster Issue 67 (Summer 2014)

[PDF file]: […] had been involved with the National Union of Students in the early 1980s. He recalled the libertarian right which was then a force in the Federation of Conservative Students – all that macho posturing in support of the Cold War, the Contras in Nicaragua and the South African government against the ANC. How many […]

Europe Isn’t Working by Larry Elliott and Dan Atkinson

Lobster Issue 72 (Winter 2016)

[PDF file]: […] that my economics tutor gave it to us non-specialists in our second year to kick around. Four years or so later this nonsense was adopted by the Conservative Party. It is unclear to me if they believed it or not. My guess would be that Mrs Thatcher and Geoffrey Howe – both tax lawyers […]

Gonzalo Lira and the kill chain

Lobster Issue 89 (2024)

[PDF file]: […] suited to the constantly-shifting kaleidoscope of life online. He had drifted into digital selfpromotion, which also allowed him an artistic outlet for his considerable intelligence. The hard-right conservative capitalist Gonzalo Lira, March 2022 reinvented himself as ‘Coach Red Pill’,5 a nickname he admitted was ‘cringey’ marketing. Using this brand, Lira published a steady output […]

The Rise of New Labour: Into Office

Lobster Issue 68 (Winter 2014)

[PDF file]: […] excessively high exchange rate.’ – Wynne Godley, The Observer (Business) 23 August 1998. By the time Labour took office Brown and Blair had promised to toe the conservative line on economic policy: no income tax rises, no increased public spending, no attempts to use government to direct the economy; and no reacquisition of the […]

Peer group pressure

Lobster Issue 78 (Winter 2019)

[PDF file]: […] feature which Mandelson’s connection with a cyber security outfit suggested: Labour peers seem to have a far greater predilection for working with cyber security firms than do Conservative peers. 1 Judging by the political affiliations of Vice Chairs of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Cyber Security,2 which MPs can join, this is […]

Is there a ‘political class’?

Lobster Issue 61 (Summer 2011)

[PDF file]: Is there a ‘political class’? Scott Newton It has become fashionable to argue that Britain is in the grip of its own ‘political class’. Most recently the idea has been promulgated by Peter Oborne, in his 2007 book, The Triumph of the Political Class. I have been sceptical about this, remembering the dominance of Oxbridge-educated […]

The Western Union Clandestine Committee: Britain and the ‘Gladio’ networks

Lobster Issue 72 (Winter 2016)

[PDF file]: […] Executive (SOE) were instigated. One figure who played a part in the preparations for what would become the ‘Gladio’ networks was British military intelligence officer (and future Conservative MP) officer Airey Neave. From late May of 1942, Neave was an officer in the ‘escape and evasion’ department MI9 and engaged in ‘secret communications with […]

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