Posts
Dave Osler: Lists LOL and Addle
Dave Osler's Dave'spart blog has added both your humble blogger and friend Adele (Crazy World) to his blogroll. I'm chuffed.
Dave is a consistently good source of interesting and well-researched posts and being as he has worked his way back to Labour from the independent left he attracts some Trotty flame interest.
He has analysis of the phenomenon of Big Issue founder John Bird standing for London Mayor and of independents in general. Comments go off on tangents about Galloway and PR.
Bird was a WRP-er when the Libyan money was pouring into their paper. But that's not all. “Actually,” someone called John Bird told the Standard in 1997, “I was a member of something called the Socialist Party of Great Britain at school for a while. You had to pass an exam, you know. You could not just join”. I am now told by a comrade that this may have been John Bird of Bremner, Bird and Fortune. Nonetheless Big Issue John Bird is a former sectarian leftie.
We had The Big Issue in Manchester in 1992, soon after the 1991 launch in London and the sale of the previously fiercely independent City Life, which I had 
co-founded, sold to the auld enemy MEN that we had set up specifically to counter.
John Bird was impressed with Ruth Turner and sprang to her aid: “I just don’t believe this. She was religiously straight - almost like a zealot.” Which may translate roughly to 'Ruth simply wouldn't let me pull the fiddles I wanted'!!
AND ANOTHER THING: Despite his revolutionary socialist background Bird was courted assiduously by Cameron's Tories to be their candidate. They are making some strange moves on recruitment and selection. But no-one is taken in. Same old same old.
5 comments:
I have represented several journalists employed by the Big Issue in the North in personal cases.
The way they have treated some of them has been diabolical.
It is not the flagship of liberalism it might appear to be.
Wasn't it John Bird , the satyrist of Bremner , Bird and Fortune fame , rather than Big Issue Bird who was briefly a member of the SPGB .
Miles: Indeed. There is a good old roasting for them on bessie Dave's site. Meanwhile at City Life we paid ourselves £35 when our EAS was £40 and even at the end of the co-op phase both the wages and the arsey 'managerial' behaviour - notably from the one who sold out and was the only one who kept a job directly - was there for all to see. But - solidarity - self exploitation among consenting adults in co-ops is OK.
AJohnstone: You may be right and I'll try to check that. The particular Bird concerned was not identified in the SPGB archivey thing I found. But nonetheless Big Issue Bird is a one time revolutionary socialist. That's not in dispute is it? And seriously considered running as a Tory?
PS "Satyrist"?
It was the comedian not the Big Issue who was a member of the SPGB.
He joined the local Branch in Nottingham in the late 50s or early 60s, before going to University.
Post a Comment