Post War Britain with David Runciman

Now this is one I am listening to.

And Now Win the Peace, Labour Party Poster, for the 1945 General Election 

It is the story of Britain after the end of the Second World War.

It covers all the great immediate moments from the victory of the Labour party and the rejection of Churchill just weeks after VE Day.

And goes on look at the Beveridge Report, the Soldier's Vote, Labour's Manifesto, Healthcare for all and much more.

"David Runciman tells the story of one of the biggest shocks in British parliamentary history: the 1945 election and the dawn of a new age".*

The programmes last just 15 minutes on BBC Radio 4 and runs to 20 episodes.

Location; BBC Radio 4

Picture; And Now Win the Peace, Labour Party Poster, for the 1945 General Election, The Labour Party

*Post War, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0lg93jb

Tony Lloyd ….. the exhibition

I didn’t know Tony Lloyd that well but those who did spoke of a caring principled individual who made his mark through civic service.

 My wikipedia tells me that he was "a British Labour politician. He served as a member of Parliament (MP) for 36 years, making him one of the longest-serving MPs in recent history. 

He served as MP for Stretford from 1983 to 1997, Manchester Central from 1997 to 2012, and represented Rochdale from 2017 until his death in 2024. 

He was Greater Manchester Police and Crime Commissioner between 2012 and 2017 and served as the interim Mayor of Greater Manchester in his last two years in the role".*

And before that he was a councillor for the Clifford Ward on Trafford Council from 1979 to 1984 becoming Deputy Labour Council Leader.

All of that and more is available to read, but what I found particularly illuminating was an exhibition devoted to the life and work of Tony Lloyd supported by the Communications Union.

Here can be found pictures, and stories along with tributes from friends, political colleagues and opponents as well as heaps of memorabilia.

In an age when it is “clever” to be cynical and deride those who chose a career in public service, this exhibition is a timely remember of what that service can achieve.

The exhibition is in the basement of Manchester Central Reference  Library, St Peter’s Square till, June 30th 2025**

Location; Central Ref

Pictures; the exhibition, 2025, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Tony Lloyd, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Lloyd

**Tony Lloyd Exhibition, https://librarylive.co.uk/event/tony-lloyd-exhibition/

Hard won elections ……. and disappointing results ….. Manchester …. 1894-98

It is of course an obvious observation that political fortunes wax and wane, and the mould breaking gains of one year become the pit of electoral despair the following year.

ILP logo, 1893-1975

And so it was with the Independent Labour Party, which shortly after its formation won two seats in the 1894 elections to Manchester City Council.  The real significance of which was that they were the first two Labour councillors.

In what were fiercely fought contests in which the Conservative were not above using scare tactics, the ILP won the Bradford and Openshaw wards.  In Bradford John Edward Sutton took 54% of the vote, and in Openshaw Jessie Butler gained a narrow majority with 50% of the total vote.

Across the city the ILP had put up candidates in eleven of the fifteen seats and in total  got just over 10,000 votes, coming a decent second in Harpurhey, racking up an impressive 1,261 in New Cross and four figure results in another six wards, with only St John’s falling below the trend with just 83 votes.

ILP share of the vote, 1895

But anyone who follows local elections  will know that there can be wide variations from one year to the next, and the fortunes of the ILP  prove testimony to the rule.

In 1895, they contested just five of the 15 seats, gained none and returned shares of the total vote ranging from 37% in Harpurhey down to 11% in Miles Platting, while in Bradford they sank to just 21% and in Openshaw got a marginally better 26%.

And while they contested more seats in the following  year, achieving four figure results in five of the seven wards, it would not be until 1897 that ILP candidates were returned.

ILP & SDF results, 1897

In Bradford, John Edward Sutton was reelected, and was joined by another ILP candidate in Harpurhey, and a member of Social Democratic Federation in St George’s Ward.

Of course, what is missing from these elections results is the politics behind them, and to judge the significance of what happened you have to fall back on the national as well as the local scene to provide a context.

And that I have yet to do.

But the victories in 1894 were in part a response to the way the ILP had organized in the working-class areas in the city and in particular to the bitter coal strike in 1893 which commentators at the time thought was decisive in the ILP gaining Bradford and Openshaw, many of whose electors worked at Bradford Colliery, and who also identified with Mr. Sutton and Mr. Butler who were miners.

John Edward Sutton, date unknown

Equally we know that in 1878 which saw the election of the two ILP and one SDF councilor, local factors came into play.  In the case of Bradford, John Edward Sutton was a respected councillor who was defending his seat, and was reelected but with a reduced share of the vote.

In Harpurhey the ILP had achieved consistent good results over the previous two years, and in Openshaw Jessie Butler who failed to regain his seat lost because the Labour vote was split.

Mr. Butler according to the Manchester Guardian “came out this time simply on Labour lines, having severed his connection with the Independent Labour Party for various reason, and had to meet the opposition of many of his old supporters and the solid body of Conservatives”.*

And while the ILP did not put up a candidate, he achieved just 40% of the vote.

I wish there were more local detail but that will have to wait till Iam next in Central Ref  and I can look through the local media, which  I am confident will provide the background to what was happening in the city between 1894 and 1897 and is also a nudge to me to delve deeper into the national political scene.

For now, that is it.

Pictures; logo of the ILP, 1893-1975, John Edward Sutton date unknown, election results from the Manchester Guardian, 1894-98

*The Municipal Elections, The Manchester Guardian, November 2nd, 1897

Mrs. Mary Francis Kelsall of Chorlton ……… politician ……. textile worker …… and mother

I like the way that a story I wrote just a few days ago can come back with a series of twists.*

Mary Frances Kelsall, on her 90th birthday, 1979

In this case it began with a story of a Mr. Brightman who stood for election to the City Council in the November of 1945 for the Chorlton-cum-Hardy ward. ** 

Election leaflet, Chorlton -cum-Hardy Labour Party, 1945

His running mate was a Mrs. Kellsall and I promised to return when I knew more about her.

And out of the blue Trevor James emailed me with, “I know of Mrs. Kelsall. I did quite a bit of family history work for a lady in Wisconsin – on a quid pro quo basis, as she did lots for me in the USA. 

As our research progressed, parallels grew. It ended up with finding that my mother had travelled daily into town with a distant relative of [the Wisconsin lady] – the said Mrs. Kelsall. This was immediately post-WW2. 

The Kelsall’s lived on the Barlow Hall estate, on Floyd Avenue.”***

And that was enough to spur me on, fulfil the promise, and fin her I did. 

Doreen, Frances & Mary Francis Kelsall, 1928

She was Mary Frances, born in 1889, married in 1913, with two children, and died in 1985.

In 1921 the family were at 10 Bland Street Moss Side, and she worked as a shirt machinist for Central Shirt Co, at 19 East Street, which employed 739 people.

The firm is listed in the 1911 directory in a building it shared with various companies, including a merchant, embroider hat manufacturer shipping merchants and Milling engineers.  The large building was at the end of East Street as it ran into Bale Street and stood opposite the famous Tommy Ducks pub.

By 1939 she was living at 18 Floyd Avenue off Barlow Moor Road.

And in 1945 according to the minutes of the Chorlton Labour Party she was one of six members who were invited to attend a selection meeting “for the final choice of candidates”. ****

Looking through the record of the Party for the 1940s I can at present find only one other reference to her, which was in June 1945 when she is listed as a sub agent in the forthcoming General Election.

At that particular meeting the group had discussed the “broad principles of the campaign”, along with “general arrangements for meetings, committee rooms, clerical work, literature and canvassing”.*****

Mr. Brightman had been appointed agent and the sub agents were Mr. Luly for Withington, Mr. Ball for Chorlton and Mrs. Kelsall for East Didsbury.All of which appeared in an account of Mrs. Kellar on Friday, but what was missing was a photograph and I began the piece lamenting that “I doubt I will ever turn up a picture of Mary Frances Kelsall”.

Manchester Labour and Election News, October, 1945

And now like a corporation bus I have two both of which turned up at the same time, for which I have Mary L Price of Wisconsin to that thank.

She is related to Mrs. Kelsall and kindly offered up the three images.

So finally, I can look on her, while as yet there is only Labour Party election leaflet featuring her name and policies, I am confident more will out.

And on a personal note I was the election agent for the Chorlton Labour Party from 1980 till 1987 and again during the early 1990s. As such I oversaw the historic first victory of a Labour candidate in Chorlton in 1986 and was one of the sub agents in the Manchester Withington Parliamentary election which saw Keith Bradley elected as the first Labour MP.

Chorlton Labour Party Election material, 1980

I don't know if Mrs Kelsall was still living in the area or if she retained her political beliefs but I like to think it makes a link between me and her.

Location; Chorlton-cum-Hardy

Pictures: Mary Frances Kelsall aged 90, 1979, and in 1928 with her two children, courtesy of Mary L Price, and Election material from 1945, courtesy of M G Wittard, and Chorlton Labour Party Election material, 1980, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Mrs. Mary Frances Kelsall ……… an election …. and the search for her story, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2022/11/mrs-mary-frances-kelsall-election-and.html

**Mr. Brightman ….. Chorlton-cum-Hardy……… and the election of 1945, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2020/11/mr-brightman-chorlton-cum-hardy-and.html

***Trevor James, November 21st 2022

****Minutes of the Chorlton Labour Party September 13th, 1945

*****Minutes of the Chorlton Labour Party November 6th, 1945

The forgotten picture …… and a heap of stories

Today, with the passage of 45 years I have no idea where the picture was taken or exactly when.

I know it will be sometime between April 1979 and August 1982 and it featured Michael Foot at a demonstration organised by the Labour Party.

In the March of ’79 the Labour Party had been defeated in the General Election and in the following two- and a-bit years the new Conservative Government reduced public spending at a time when unemployment was beginning to rise.

The response of the labour movement was to organise a series of large public demonstrations.  The first was in Liverpool and over the course of the next few years there were more, along with marches against many of the policies of the new Tory Government.

I was at the 1980 Liverpool rally and the one in Birmingham three years later and I rather think this picture is from neither of those events.

But someone will know.

For many years the picture hung on a wall but with the passage of time was moved several times until without its frame it was put away and finally came out of the shadows last week.

I had bought the image from the Morning Star which had covered the event and a requisite of purchasing it was that I had to take out a  £ share in the newspaper.

And as so often happens round about the time I found Mr. Foot I also came across my Membership card for The People's Press Printing Society, which my Wikipedia tells me “is a readers' co-operative with the purpose of owning and publishing a left-wing, British, daily newspaper. 

The co-operative was established in 1945, with shares sold at £1. Originally the paper was titled the Daily Worker, but the publication was re-launched as the Morning Star in 1966.

On 6 January 1946, at the Albert Hall in London, Bill Jones, the leader of the London busmen's trade union, handed over the formal document of transfer to William Rust (editor of the Daily Worker). Ownership of the Daily Worker was transferred from the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) to the PPPS, with CPGB retaining editorial and political control of the paper until in 1951, the Daily Worker Co-operative Society was established to act as the nominal publishers of the paper.

The Daily Worker Co-operative Society became the Morning Star Co-operative Society which later became bankrupt and the sole ownership for the publication of the Morning Star fell under the People's Press Printing Society. 

The People’s Press Printing Society has a difficult financial existence, making a £41,179 loss in 2013 and a £1,137 surplus in 2014”.

So as the society is still going I guess that still makes me a member.

Leaving me just to say that I can date the photograph to between 1979 and 1982, because the address on the card was where I lived during those three years.

And while there I bought heaps of those campaign badges to support and highlight cuts in public services, factory closures and the “great” international issues of the day.

All of which I had an opinion on and would argue the case to anyone in ear shot.

And that pretty much is that.

Others will have their favourite badge and I did have difficulty choosing from my 40 which are all that have survived the four decades and more.

But they are my choice

Pictures; Michael Foot addresses a large open air meeting, circa 1979-82, courtesy of the Morning Star, and badges I wore, circa 1979 to 87, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*The People's Press Printing Society, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Press_Printing_Society

Two cameras …… and a heap of demonstrations

During the 1970s into the 1980s I spent a great chunk of time photographing demonstrations.

London, 1981

They ranged from those against the far right along with several under the banner of the Anti-Nazi League.

Along with these there were plenty calling for a halt in public spending cuts, policies to reverse the staggering rise in unemployment and protests at the proliferation of a new generation of nuclear war heads and their delivery systems.

I missed recording the big anti Vietnam demonstration of 1968 and the White City Springbok  one.

And by the mid 90s I was balancing being a single parent with work so it wasn’t until the new millennium that kitted out with a digital camera I was back joining protests on another series of Conservative Governments who were cutting public services all over again and more recently rallies against antisemitism.

Birmingham, 1983

These three pictures come from a demonstration in Liverpool organised by the Labour Party in 1980 against job losses, London in 1981 against the deployment of US Cruise Missiles, and another  Labour march in Birmingham two years later demanding policies which would halt the spiralling number being made unemployed.

Liverpool, 1980

Back then I had two K Pentax cameras which were pretty indestructible and performed under a hot Greek sun, steamy holidays in Paris and indifferent wet British weather.

Location; the 1980s, in London and Birmingham

Pictures, Liverpool, 1980, London, 1981 and Birmingham,  1983, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Drama on election night in Manchester ……………. new Party makes gains and threatens the Establishment ………..

It is the sort of headline the media delights to run, and will follow up with acres of “in depth investigation”, penetrating discussion, and of course soundbites from members of the public.

Solidarity, 1887

Back in 1894, the Manchester Guardian was less dramatic, more measured and a tad dismissive of the election of the first two Labour candidates to the city council.

They were John Edward Sutton and Jessie Butler, both worked in the coal industry, and both were members of the recently formed Independent Labour Party which had been established to campaign for the election of working class candidates at local and Parliamentary elections.

The Manchester Guardian was quick to point out both men were the outsiders.  

Mr. Sutton who was standing in the Bradford Ward was up against a sitting councillor who had been elected unopposed since 1888, “when he defeated Liberals and independent candidates by a majority of considerably more than a thousand.”

In Openshaw which was the other Labour gain the seat had been won by the Liberals the previous year with a majority of over 700 votes.

Labour makes gains, 1894

But as ever the devil is in the detail, and the Bradford branch of the ILP had in the words of the Manchester Guardian “practically grown from nothing to its present strength in the course of the past three years”

Moreover, some of the working families in both wards would have owed their livelihood to the Bradford Colliery, and the year before the industry had faced a major national strike following the employer’s decision to cut coal miners wages by one quarter, while the Miner’s Federation demanded a “living wage” for the workforce.

ILP logo, 1893-1975

The industrial conflict grew bitter, troops were dispatched to some of the coalfields, and as tensions grew strikers at Featherstone in Yorkshire were fired on, with sixteen hit and two killed, while in Llanelly, in Wales “police  armed with cutlasses” guarded the colliery after the cavalry had been withdrawn.**

The strike ran through the summer of 1893, and concluded in the November, and it appears to have played a major part in both Mr. Sutton and Mr. Butler becoming involved in politics.  John Edward Sutton joined the ILP during the strike and by its end, was “has been one of the principle leaders at the Bradford branch of the Independent Labour Party”.

While for Mr. Butler who was an assistant to the secretary of the Miner’s Federation , it “was in part the action taken by the Labour Party on behalf of the miners which [led him] to become a member”. 

The ILP arrives, Manchester, 1894

Both contests were hard fought with the Conservatives in the Openshaw ward distributing leaflets which branded the ILP as a vote for “Socialism and Anarchy”, but as the Manchester Guardian observed “It is improbable, however that the working class electors in the ward, who are perfectly familiar with Mr. Butler were in the slightest  degree influenced by an appeal exhibiting such a limited amount of intelligence”.***

And in Bradford Ward, despite the Conservatives  having “for some years occupied a strong position in this ward, holding all three seats ……. A large section of the working men, however, have expressed dissatisfaction with [the Tory candidate] and they gave effect to their feeling by nominating Mr. Sutton and working energetically in his behalf”.

ILP gain, Bradford, Manchester, 1894

A degree of confidence which saw them continue to elect him to the City Council for almost 20 years and followed that up with electing him as the MP in 1910, again in 1922 and from 1923 through to 1931.

But for many on that night of November 1894 the ILP’s entry on to the Manchester electoral scene was something to savour.  

In total they got just over 10,000 votes spread out across the eleven wards they contested, and racked up some very decent three figure results, some of which like at Harpurhey brought them close to being the second party.

John Edward Sutton, date unknown

All of which were promises for the future, while at Bradford and Openshaw the promise had arrived.

John Edward Sutton secured 2072 votes, ahead of his Tory rival who achieved 1,757, which gave the ILP a majority of 335, and 54% share of the vote.

In Openshaw it was a closer contest with Labour winning by 22 votes, but that is not to diminish the result.

Such can be election dramas.

Location; Manchester, 1894

Pictures; Solidarity, Walter Crane, 1887, extract from the Manchester Guardian, November 2nd, 1894, Logo of the ILP, 1893-1975, Manchester election results, November, November 2nd, 1894, and John Edward Sutton, date unknown

*The Municipal Elections, Manchester, the Manchester Guardian, November 2nd, 1894

**The Coal Strike, the Manchester Guardian, September 26, 1893

***Salford Eccles A General survey of the elections, the Manchester Guardian, November 2nd, 1984

Mrs. Mary Frances Kelsall ……… an election …. and the search for her story

I doubt I will ever turn up a picture of Mary Frances Kelsall.

Chorlton election material, 1980

She was born in 1889 and died just short of her hundredth birthday.

And until this week she was just a name in a story of a Chorlton local election held in the November of 1945.*

She was one of the two Labour candidates who stood in that election and to my shame only had a walk on part in a post which focused on the other candidate who was a Mr. Brightman.

To be fair the story had been occasioned by a discussion with a relative of Mr. Brightman who supplied some of the background information on the man and the election.

But I closed with the promise that I would go looking for Mrs. Kelsall who been Labour’s other candidate.

Of course, I got distracted and never did, until Monday when I received an email from a fellow researcher who wrote, “I know of Mrs. Kelsall. I did quite a bit of family history work for a lady in Wisconsin – on a quid pro quo basis, as she did lots for me in the USA. 

As our research progressed, parallels grew. It ended up with finding that my mother had travelled daily into town with a distant relative of [the Wisconsin lady] – the said Mrs. Kelsall. This was immediately post-WW2. 

The Kelsalls lived on the Barlow Hall estate, at no.16 Floyd Avenue, +/-2. My mother said that Mrs. K. was extremely left-wing and pushy, whereas Mr. K. was laid back to the point of horizontal and totally apolitical. Personally, I have no recollection of the family at all”.**

And that was enough to spur me on and fulfil the promise.

I have found Mrs. Kelsall on the 1939 Register at 18 Floyd Avenue.

She was Mary Frances nee Wade, born in 1889, married in 1913, with two children, and died in 1985.

In 1921 the family were at 10 Bland Street Moss Side, and she worked as a shirt machinist for Central Shirt Co, at 19 East Street, which employed 739 people.

The firm is listed in the 1911 directory in a building it shared with various companies, including a merchant, embroider hat manufacturer shipping merchants and Milling engineers.  The large building was at the end of East Street as it ran into Bale Street and stood opposite the famous Tommy Ducks pub.

And according to the minutes of the Chorlton Labour Party she was one of six members who were invited to attend a selection meeting “for the final choice of candidates”. ***

Looking through the record of the Party for the 1940s I can at present find only one other reference to her, which was in June 1945 when she is listed as a sub agent in the forthcoming General Election.

At that particular meeting the group had discussed the “broad principles of the campaign”, along with “general arrangements for meetings, committee rooms, clerical work, literature and canvassing”.

In the footsetps of Mrs. Kelsall, 1986

Mr. Brightman had been appointed agent and the sub agents were Mr. Luly for Withington, Mr. Ball for Chorlton and Mrs. Kelsall for East Didsbury.

And that is about it.

Despite the huge landslide victory for the Labour Party at the General Election in the July of 1945, the Municipal Elections in the November proved disappointing for both Labour’s Chorlton candidates.

The Conservative candidates, each gained 66.9% of the vote with Mrs. Kelsall achieving 33.1% and Mr. Brightman 31.4% .

But then Labour had never won a seat in Chorlton.  

In the early 20th century, the electors had returned either Tory or Liberal councillors, and after 1945 would continue to elect Conservative candidates until the historic breakthrough in 1986.

Looking back at the local campaign, the election agent commented that “Chorlton ward had polled well, in spite of the lack of many prominent workers, who were fighting in other wards”, which traditionally was the fate of local elections in Chorlton until the 1970s.***

I doubt Mr. Brightman looked upon the result as poor, given that he and Mrs. Kelsall each polled nearly a third of the vote in what was then a traditional Conservative seat.

They had campaigned on welfare issues and the need for post war reconstruction, and looked to Labour gaining a “majority of all other parties” and thereby by playing its part in supporting the “enactments of the people’s Parliament”.*****

And that is it, although I will now trawl the local Manchester papers for more references to Mrs. Kelsall and hold out the hope that someone remembers her.

We shall see.

Chorlton Labour Party, circa 1980s

Location; Chorlton

Pictures; Election material from 1980, Chorlton Labour Party badge circa 1980, and campaigning in the 1986 local elections from the collection of Andrew Simpson

* Mr. Brightman ….. Chorlton-cum-Hardy……… and the election of 1945, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2020/11/mr-brightman-chorlton-cum-hardy-and.html

**Trevor James, November 21st 2022

***Minutes of the E.C. meeting, Chorlton Ward, Thursday September 13th, 1945.

**** Minutes of the Chorlton Labour Party, November 6th, 1945

***** Election Address, November 1st, 1945

Mr. Brightman ….. Chorlton-cum-Hardy……… and the election of 1945

 This is the story of the 1945 election, but not the famous one which sent the Labour Party back to power, and led to the creation  of the National Health Service, and other collective reforms which we now know as the Welfare State.

That election had been in the July of 1945, and a few months later in November, the electors of Manchester went back to the polling booths to elect candidates for the City Council.

The Labour Party were so confident of substantial gains, that they decided to contest every seat in the city.  As the Manchester Guardian reported “for the first time since municipal elections were held in Manchester  the Labour party has nominated a candidate for every vacant seat.  Even the small business wards in the central area – Exchange, Oxford and St Ann’s are being contested”.*

And the article went on to report that “it is an open secret that even the most optimistic Conservatives are concerned not so much about how many seats they can gain as about how many of the 28 seats they are defending they can hold”.

The Party’s local election manifesto stressed the importance of giving the Labour Party control of the City Council so that it could support and deliver locally the national programme of reform, arguing “if progressive policies at Westminster are to be interpretated into realities up and down the country it is the people elected to the local authorities who will have to make them effective”, arguing the track record of the Conservatives had been to obstruct those “progressive policies” …… “the simple fact is that the Tories in a majority have always been fighting a rearguard action against the incessant demands of the people expressed by Labour”.

And nowhere more so than in the case of clearing the slums because “three fourths of Manchester’s 200-000 houses are obsolete by modern standards and half of them unfit to live in , [with] only six out of every ten having baths”.**

Here in Chorlton, the local Labour Party had selected Mr. W. H. Brightman, and Mrs Kelsall, from a list of six at a meeting on September 23rd. 

Earlier in the month Mr. Brightman had indicated in a letter that he could not accept the nomination to the selection panel “as he would be engaged in London for a week or more on Trade Union business”.***

Now there is no record of why despite his absence he was selected but it is clear that he had a proven record of service to both the Labour party and the trade union movement.

According to his election address he was known to “many hundreds of Chorlton residents having lived among them for more than 25 years, had played his part in Hertfordshire in the Parliamentary elections of 1906-11. 

Joined the Labour Party in 1914, a member of the Manchester and Salford Co-operative Party  for many years.  

He was first vice chairman of the Manchester Shipping Guild which he helped form, and was a member of the Executive Committee of the Manchester Council of Labour”.****

He had held various posts in the Withington Constituency Labour Party, Chorlton Labour Party, and the City Labour Group.

And here I have his great grandson to thank for much of the material on Mr. Brightman, as well as a brief biography, from which I learned that Mr. Brightman was born in Islington, and moved to Manchester in 1914 with his second wife, finally settling in Albermarle Road in Chorlton.

His election address echoed the Party manifesto , and argued that “unless the Government of the day has the general support of the local council the maximum benefit of existing and future legislation cannot be achieved.  Those enactments must be loyally and capably effected by the local authorities”.

Across the City, the Labour Party did very well, holding on to “all the twenty-one seats it was defending and gained  an additional fourteen  - eleven from the Conservatives and three from the Liberals”.*****

And despite failing to win overall control by just four seats, it was the most successful election “the Labour party has ever fought in Manchester and the Labour members are now for the first time the largest groups in the council”.

Sadly neither Mr. Brightman nor Mrs. Kelsall were successful.  

The Conservative candidates, each gained 66.9% of the vote with Mrs. Kelsall achieving 33.1% and Mr. Brightman 31.4% .

But then Labour had never won a seat in Chorlton.  

In the early 20th century the electors had returned either Tory or Liberal councillors, and after 1945 would continue to elect Conservative candidates until the historic breakthrough in 1986.******

Looking back at the local campaign, the election agent commented that “Chorlton ward had polled well, in spite of the lack of many prominent workers, who were fighting in other wards”, which traditionally was the fate of local elections in Chorlton until the 1970s.********

I doubt Mr. Brightman looked upon the result as poor, given that he and Mrs. Kelsall each polled nearly a third of the vote in what was then a traditional Conservative seat.

He continued living in Chorlton until sometime after 1939.  

At his death in 1950, Manchester Corporation passed a resolution of thanks ….. now that I would like to see.

Leaving me just to thank Mr. MG. Wittard for all his help in writing the story, and a promise that I will go looking for Mrs. Kelsall.

Location; Chorlton-cum-Hardy

Pictures; Labour Party Campaign poster 1945, Labour Party, Mr. Brightman, from the Election Address, and City Election News, 1945 and  Golden Wedding announcement , courtesy of Mr. MG. Wittard.

*Labour Challenge In Manchester Tories on the Defensive, Manchester Guardian, October 25, 1945

**Election Issues in Manchester, Labour and Housing, Manchester Guardian, October 20th, 1945

***Minutes of the Chorlton Labour party, September 13t,h 1945

****Election Address, November 1st, 1945

******More Labour Victories in Manchester, Manchester Guardian, November 3rd 1945

*******The first Labour candidate had been Alice McIlwrick in the November of 1928 gaining 14% of the vote.

********Minutes of the Chorlton Labour Party, November 6th, 1945

A little bit of Salford’s history from 1979

Now I came across this image in the large collection of old negatives which have sat in our cellar for forty years.

Just when I took it and where is lost in time, but it will be from around 1979.

Location; Salford

Picture; banner, 1979, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

So just what did you do for the last 45 years? …….. stories against a political background

A little bit of my past fell through the door today.

Riding Two Horses, 2022

Although to be strictly accurate it is really the history of my friend Glyn Ford.

“Riding two Horses, traces the eventful life and a career of Glyn Ford, Member of the European Parliament for 25 years and erstwhile leader of its European Parliamentary Party”.*

And I might add a local councillor for Tameside for eight years.

For those who want the rest of his political career I would just refer you to the fly leaf of this his sixth book or the collection of his essays and articles for a raft of publications, almost all of which are available. *

My five minutes of fame with Glyn started in a dingy room of the Pleasant Sunday Afternoon Brotherhood in 1974, where with another six or seven Labour Party members we were engaged in addressing and stuffing envelopes with an election leaflet for Bob Sheldon who was seeking re-election as the MP for Ashton-Under-Lyne

Kay and I had ended up in Ashton earlier in the year having migrated from south Manchester to what is now Eastlands and by following the Ashton Old Road found a modest two up two down in the town.

I had joined the Party aged 16 in 1966 and remained active through the first General Election in February 1974 into the second in October.  Glyn and I along with Kay, Hazel, Pam and Ian were all relative newcomers and with varying degrees we embraced the politics of the area.

I jumped ship in 1976 heading back to south Manchester where I sank myself the politics of Chorlton and the City.

But we kept in touch, meeting up occasionally and going on a few holidays, and from then till now I have followed Glyn’s career.

So, I was pleased to receive this book partly because it fills in the details of the last 46 years, and also because it is the backdrop to my own political landscape albeit a more modest one. 

Making the stand for social justice, The Moss Side CLP banner, Liverpool, 1980

And given that Glyn was at the centre of much that went in Europe while we were part of that political organization the book throws a light on the history of that period as well as the struggles against antisemitism, racism and confronting those ideologies of the Far Right as well as the lesser known politics of North Korea and other Asian countries.

All of which I will find fascinating to read as will the general reader.

45 years of active politics

But I couldn’t stop myself looking for just one event from the 1970s, which was when we were both on the side of leaving the Common Market and campaigned so in the European Referendum of 1975.  

I look back with a degree of wry self-deprecation, given that later I became and remain an ardent supporter of the European Union.

It is a story I have long dinned out on as does Glyn who recounts “In Ashton-Under-Lyne, we organised a ‘NO’ event.  There were six on the platform – from somewhere we’d even managed to find a Liberal against the Common Market – and five in the audience.  When the meeting’s chair announced he was a member of the Communist Party, 40% of the audience stood up and left”.***

Such are the ups and downs of political campaigns, made all the more significant when things go well, and progressive alliances are formed and progressive policies advanced which enhance the social and economic lives of us all.

And yes, it will be a book I take away on holiday.

Pictures; cover for Riding Two Horses, 2022, and the Moss Side Labour Party Banner in Liverpool, 1980 in the first big demonstration against the Conservative Government elected the year before, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*“Riding Two Horses Labour in Europe, Glyn Ford, 2022

**www.glynford.eu

***Ford, ibid page 76

A Manchester first ……… John Edward Sutton .... first Labour Councillor and Manchester MP

John Edward Sutton deserves to be remembered.

John Edward Sutton, MP

He was the first Labour candidate to be elected to the Manchester City Council, went on to become the first Labour MP for Manchester East in 1910, and later represented Manchester Clayton for a short period in 1922, and again between 1923 and 1931.

All the more remarkable given that he started work in a cotton mill at seven years of age in 1871, and at 14 began work at Bradford Colliery rising to the post of checkweighman.

His obituary in the Manchester Guardian records that he was first elected to the Bradford Ward as a City Councillor in 1894, continuing as such for nearly 20 years, and was “secretary and then agent for the Bradford lodge of the Lancashire and Cheshire Miner’s Federation”.*

Today when many defeated politicians go on to utilize their Parliamentary experience and contact to carve out jobs in the media and as lobbyist, it might surprise many that  Mr. Sutton returned after his election defeats to work at the coal mine.

He was according to the newspaper “of that school of Socialists that grew out of Liberal Nonconformity through the I.L.P.  He was never a revolutionary but a strong co-operator and temperance advocate.

Labour Party Poster, 1910

Physically a somewhat frail man he had the vigour of mind and expression that belied his quiet manner and a courage that put him among the pioneers in the workers’ cause at the end of the last century.  

He was not merely Manchester’s first Labour councillor but a firm advocate of municipal ownership of essential local services and one who did much to advance the municipalizing of the transport service”.

But this does little to highlight his progressive position on a raft of issues, from support for the extension of the franchaise to women,to the need for a minimum wage and his opposition to the position of Aldermen on the City Council.

And having opposed the practice of Aldermen, rightly he turned down the offer to become one in 1909.

In time I will find out more about this remarkable man.  I know his father was a cotton spinner and one of John Edward Sutton’s first homes was on London Road, that he married Hannah in 1880 when they were both just 19 years old.

Solidarity, Walter Crane, 1887

In 1911 the family were living in a five roomed house in Clayton a year after he was elected an MP and by 1939 he and his two children were living in Chorlton on Egerton Road.

Labour Party Poster, 1945

And that is it at present.  

There is one photograph of Mr. Sutton, but it is unclear if it can be used and so I have fallen back on a very poor copy from his obituary.

The next step will be visits to the Labour History Museum and Central Ref to trawl their records for more on his time as a councillor, MP and trade unionist, and if I am lucky there may be election material, correspondence and more pictures.

But I am pleased that he lived long enough to see the Labour Party returned to office in the July of 1945 with 393 MPs on a promise to carry out many of the policies he himself argued for.**

Reflecting on his his time as an elected representative he said "he had fought many municipal elections and nine Parliamentary elections and met with his first defeat in 23 years of public life".***

The occasion was a presentation at the Beswick Co-operative Society's Hall in Manchester to mark his retirement.  

Labour Poster, 1931

The hall was packed and amongst the speakers and well wishers there were many colleagues from the early days of the I.L.P.*** 

But consistent with his character, in 1939, eight years after his defeat in the 1931 General Election when Labour recorded one of its worst defeats, he listed his occupation as not former MP, but "Coal Miners Agent, Retired" 

Location; Manchester

Pictures; Solidarity, Walter Crane, 1887, Labour Party posters, 1910, 1931 & 1945, Mr. J.E. Sutton, date unknown

*Mr. J.E. Sutton, Manchester Guardian, November 30th, 1945

**The 1945 General Election was held in July 1945, and Mr. Sutton died in November of that year.

***Presentation to Mr. J.E.Sutton, 38 years of Public Service, Manchester Guardian, July 15th, 1932

Reading the unacceptable ……..

In the month that the Equality and Human Rights Commission published Investigation into antisemitism in the Labour Party, I am rereading “That’s Funny You Don’t Look Anti-Semitic”, by Steve Cohen.

Steve Cohen was a member of the International Marxist Group and wrote the book in 1984.

In the forward his son has written that after the Israeli invasion of Lebanon his father started a book condemning the invasion and “During the research stumbled across Left antisemitism by self-described ‘anti racists’ time and time again … This racism perpetuated by leaders of the radical and revolutionary Left was an affront to his sense.”

The book ranges over historic “left antisemitism", highlighting the actions of Ben Tillett, Robert Blatchford and even Keir Hardie, and in a series of chapters focuses on the position of leading members of the left in the 1970s and 80s.

For those of us who always identified with the Left, the book makes disturbing reading particularly in the light of the current debate around the failure of the Labour Party during 2015-2019 to effectively address the issue of antisemitic complaints.  

And leaves me reflecting on those who currently seek to portray the previous leader of the Labour Party and some of his allies as the victims in the fall out from that report.

*“That’s Funny You Don’t Look Anti-Semitic”, Steve Cohen, 1984, republished by No Pasaran Media Ltd 2019

Bob Sheldon ...... 1923-2020

I was saddened at the news of the death of Robert Sheldon, who had a long record of service, first as a Manchester City Councillor, then MP for Ashton-Under-Lyne, and from 2001 as Baron Sheldon of Ashton-Under-Lyne.

Mr. and Mr.s Sheldon, 1970

I knew him from my days in the Ashton-Under-Lyne Labour Party.

And one who knew him much better was John Evans, who reflected on Bob Sheldon’s long career.

“Robert (Lord) Sheldon, or Bob, as he was universally known, who has died aged 96, was Labour M.P. for Ashton-under-Lyne for 37 years from 1964. 

He had a distinguished career, serving in the Wilson and Callaghan Governments as a Treasury Minister, and later as a long serving and tenacious Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee. Born in Manchester, he made his home in Didsbury and prior to being elected to Parliament he had been on Manchester City Council, and contested Withington in 1959. 

Election result, 1964

He had also established his own textile company, having started out as an engineer. I had the privilege of being Bob’s constituency secretary for several years. Being M.P. for Ashton was no walk in the park. Like many towns in “cottonopolis” it had by the 1960s seen better days. 

Bob however immediately endeared himself to the folk of Ashton and fought their corner to the end – whether it was against tyrannical employers, the insensitivities of the then DHSS, the ineptitude of the (albeit Labour Controlled) Tameside Council, which took over local government in 1974, or the plights of asylum seekers who had gravitated to Ashton from all parts of the world. [The area has a tradition of welcoming those who have been by famine, turmoil and upheaval going back two centuries]. 

Labour election poster, 1966

I recollect many an encounter when on the doorstep canvassing at elections, coming across disgruntled residents who felt unhappy with their lot. “I’m going to see Bob Sheldon about this” they would intone. And see Bob they did, in their thousands over the years. His Friday advice surgeries in the Town Hall would be packed, and always over ran. I recall visiting him in his Treasury office when he was Financial Secretary to find him almost buried by that day’s post from constituents seeking his help on this and that. 

My enduring memories of Bob are as someone who was very self-effacing and quite private, but also subtlety charismatic. He had a commanding and endearing presence, coupled with a measured and mellifluous intonation when speaking – whether to a meeting or in private. 

I don’t think that in his years in Government that he ever really slept. He certainly very rarely took a holiday. Ashtonians have much to be thankful for in the devotion and service of Bob Sheldon. 

My thoughts are with Mary, Terry , Gillian and their families".

John Evans.

Pictures, Labour Party May Dance, George Lawton Hall, Mossley, Mr. and Mrs. Robert Sheldon, circa 1971, Reporter Newspaper (Photo No. 71-5-25), courtesy of Tameside, MBC, t10774,1964 Election result, Guardian, October 16th, 1964,  Labour Party Poster, 1966