The general elections of 1945, 1979 and 1997 are rightly deemed to be milestones in postwar British political history. But if Ed Miliband leads Labour to victory in 2015, that achievement will instantly earn itself a place in the history books. Put to one side Labour’s narrow win in February 1974 – when it won …

Labour is right to talk about immigration but must avoid charges of cynicism and opportunism The politics of immigration form rather neat bookends around Gordon Brown’s premiership. In the speech to Labour party conference in September 2007 in which he was widely expected to call a snap general election, the new prime minister promised ‘British …

Labour’s link with the trade unions is important. That is why it must be made to work Labour’s relationship with the trade unions in Britain is unique. No other centre-left party in the world has unions formally affiliated to it, with the rights, power and responsibilities this entails. This link has been a source of …

Both Labour and the Tories can learn from Barack Obama’s re-election Barack Obama’s re-election last month was a remarkable feat. He joins Bill Clinton as only the second Democrat president since Franklin Roosevelt to win a second term. And he won that second term against an economic backdrop more akin to that which faced Roosevelt …

Progress launches a debate on the challenges the party faces The aftermath of the financial crisis can hardly be said to have ushered in a golden era for European social democracy. Throughout the continent, centre-left parties have struggled to present a plausible alternative to the right’s message of belt-tightening and budget-balancing, and have paid a …

Having laid the foundations for recovery, Labour must soon set about building a platform for victory The Labour party which meets in Manchester this month is undeniably politically stronger and more confident than that which met in the city two years ago in the wake of its spring general election defeat. A strong, if unspectacular, …

Labour will capitalise on the coalition’s troubles only if it builds a broad coalition of voters Not since the summer of 2007 when, for a brief moment, Gordon Brown appeared on the verge of securing a fourth Labour term, has David Cameron’s leadership of the Conservative party seemed as politically inept as it has in …

Labour can show itself ready to govern by taking tough decisions on paying for the country’s care needs With George Osborne’s admission last autumn that the coalition will fail to meet its self-imposed target of eliminating the deficit by 2015 threatening to extend the ‘era of austerity’ into the next parliament, many have assumed that …

The party still lags on the economy but an honest conversation with the public about the future could help it win trust Labour is right to take no pleasure in the fact that the government has been proved wrong on the central macroeconomic question of the day: how to restore economic growth while cutting the …

Ken Livingstone’s defeat in the London mayoral election on Thursday was both shocking and unsurprising. Shocking because, despite the presence of a large number of marginal seats, London remains a ‘Labour city’ as the party’s strong performance in the London assembly elections, and the narrowness of Livingstone’s eventual loss, demonstrated. Shocking, too, because, in Boris …