Kmflett's Blog

Ted Knight 1933-2020, Socialist, Trade Unionist, Labour candidate for Hornsey 1979

I was sorry to read of the death of Ted Knight at 86.

I’ve known Ted Knight in passing since the late 1970s. He came from a (slightly) different part of the left and I always felt he was a little didactic in manner but these are matters of detail for another time.

Knight was vilified in the media, even recently, as ‘Red Ted’ because he was a socialist, a fighter for ordinary people and that never made him popular with the rich and powerful.

As leader of Lambeth Council he was one of those who led the fight against Mrs Thatcher’s rate-capping along with Bernie Grant in Haringey and others and he paid a heavy personal price for it.

He continued being active over the decades and in recent times was very active in Unite Community in South London.

He did however make a foray over the river to stand as the Labour candidate for Hornsey in 1979. There are others who could better tell the story but his selection marked a distinct shift to the left in the Labour Party locally. His Agent was a youthful Jeremy Corbyn, whose own memory of the occasion is here:

Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the Labour Party, said: “I first met Ted in the 1970s when he was a determined figure in the London Labour Party and was his agent when he stood in Hornsey in 1979. We were and remained very different characters. But it never stopped us from working together across London.

Despite the outstanding example of Jeremy Corbyn’s beard and Ken Livingstone’s moustache Ted belonged to an earlier generation of left-wing politicians who were determined to remain perpetually clean-shaven.

Ted acquitted himself creditably in the General Election which saw Mrs Thatcher enter No.10. My personal memories of the campaign relate more to chasing the Tory incumbent Hugh Rossi around Crouch End Broadway armed with a megaphone. He never seemed pleased to see me but then he wasn’t seen much in the Constituency.

General election 1979: Hornsey

Party     Candidate           Votes    %            ±

Conservative Hugh Rossi               20,225   49.37     +6.23

Labour  Edward Robert Knight    16,188   39.52     -1.67

Liberal   Patrick William O’Brien  4,058     9.91        -3.33

National Front Bruce William Pell 337      0.82        -1.61

Majority               4,037     9.85        +7.89

Turnout                40,964   70.13     +1.61

Conservative hold            Swing    +3.95

John McDonnell’s obituary is here:

https://www.john-mcdonnell.net/news/2020/03/30/a-giant-of-our-movement/

Don’t mourn, mobilise seems apt but that shouldn’t stop us saluting the efforts Ted Knight made in the labour movement over many decades.

It is the funeral of the Reverend Paul Nicholson today in Tottenham. In ordinary times I would have been there paying respects to a veteran campaigner and letter writer.

It may perhaps suggest a conspiracy of  Guardian letter writers that I knew the Reverend well. However while we discussed campaigning many times I dont ever recall discussing letter writing with him. Perhaps it is a solitary activity, very unlike campaigning.

Below is a brief appreciation I wrote on the news of his death (I had seen him in central London not long before) and also a lovely tribute from the Guardian to his letter writing.

His legacy, organise,organise,organise. Campaigning has never been more important in a society of haves and have nots. Secondly,keep writing those letters. In a democratic society a plurality of views is not only important, its essential.

Reverend Paul Nicholson (1932-2020). No home but the struggle

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/mar/30/the-rev-paul-nicolson-a-campaigning-life-in-letters

Beard Liberation Front

30th March

Contact Keith Flett 07803 167266

Guide to growing a Working From Home beard: Week 2

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that with many working from home, and barbers closed, the numbers of people growing beards is increasing significantly. It has provided a 6 step guide on how to do this.

With many work meetings now taking place virtually via Skype or Zoom a working from home beard can add gravitas to the wearers on-line presence.

BLF Organiser Keith Flett, week two is crucial to a growing from home beard. It should shortly be ready for assessment, styling, pruning etc. We’ll publish guidelines on that later in the week

Six Steps to growing a Working From Home beard

1 Do not shave and recycle all shaving equipment immediately

2  Allow facial hair to develop over a 7-10 day period

3 Wash the facial hair at least twice every day and purge any split ends

4 An organic beard grows naturally so do not trim at this stage

5 After 10 days judicious and occasional trimming may be employed. There is a fine balance between a beard that is stylish and one that is genuinely organic

6 Under trimming is better than over trimming. Over trimming may lead to having needlessly to repeat steps 1-5

Ambridge Socialist

29th March

The Archers plans to feature coronavirus in newly written episodes from 4th May.

BBC praised for hard work in making sure #TheArchers continues during COVID-19

In the meantime Ambridge’s virtual watering holes remain virtually open.

Which one would you prefer to be locked down in?

29th March 2020 is the fifth Sunday of Lent and is known as Passion Sunday in some religious traditions.

Down below however something more basic is celebrated.

The Sundays of Lent were not fasting days and on the fifth Sunday the tradition was to eat black peas left to soak overnight and then (after the Reformation) fried in butter. The tradition appears to have been particularly strong in the north-east of England.

Peas (or sometimes beans) were cheaper and easier to obtain for the poor and known as Carlins.

As Ronald Hutton notes in his of British seasonal traditions, Stations of the Sun, Carlin Sunday was ‘a feast of the poor’

The Ambridge Socialist

29^th March

All to The Virtual Bull! (for now)

Pubs in Britain are currently closed due to the Coronavirus lockdown. However the nation’s best virtual pub The Bull remains open, despite calls in the Guardian to close it.

The Ambridge Socialist calls on all readers to drop by The Bull in the next week, while keeping appropriate guidelines in place.

These include no talking to Kenton Archer and making sure to order a glass of Shires cask beer.

Ambridge Socialist Editor Keith Flett said, our campaign to Save The Bull and reverse its absurd name change came just in time. The Bull remains open to serve us in these difficult times.

Philip Moss: how long will this be going on?

More details of Philip Moss’s activities as a gangmaster have been revealed by the BBC but the question many are asking is, how long before he and Gavin get arrested? Perhaps on the other hand Sergeant Knacker Burns is preparing to arrest Blake?

A night out in Felpersham

Ben, Josh, Pip, Joy and others have been on a night out in Felpersham. A ‘one-night stand’ seems to have transpired. There was nothing graphic by Archers standards though

In Other News

Lynda has asked Peggy for permission to go to the toilet. It was granted

E P Thompson on the clocks going forward

Clocks have gone forward or back in Britain to mark summer or winter time for around a century. There are debates about how daylight is lost or gained as a result and the impact of this and these continue.

Behind that however lies an industrial obsession with time and the market capitalist idea that time is money.

A common theme of the clocks going forward for summer is that those who are not working overnight will get one less hour in bed. The subtext there is perhaps whether an hour lost is necessarily such a bad idea.

After all from the 1880s the labour movement campaigned for the 8 hour working day, which is also meant 8 hours for recreation and 8 hours for rest.

EP Thompson’s Time, Work Discipline which appeared in Past and Present in 1967, remains a foundation text.

To give a brief flavour, he writes of ‘Smilesian snippets about humble men who by rising early and diligence, made good’. He continues that as workers secured reductions in working hours moralists became concerned that ‘manual workers after concluding their work were left with several hours in the day to be spent nearly as they please’.

So that one hour lost means that pub opening time is in fact one hour nearer on a normal Sunday but not this one..

The Ambridge Socialist

29^th March

BBC praised for hard work in making sure The Archers continues during COVID-19

The Ambridge Socialist has praised BBC production staff, actors and writers for hard work involved in making sure that the BBC’s updates from Ambridge still take place after existing recorded episodes run out at the end of April.

At the moment the Archers is airing four times a week rather than the usual five (plus a shorter Omnibus) and this will continue in May.

However there will fewer characters in each episode as contributions will be recorded from home studios. In addition COVID-19 will feature in episodes from 4th May

Ambridge Socialist Editor Keith Flett said, this will have been a lot of hard work. We look forward to hearing more detail about the class struggle in Borsetshire from the Grundys

https://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/latestnews/2020/coronavirus-archers?at_custom3=%40bbcpress&at_custom4=512998AE-7140-11EA-A0D2-FDD2C28169F1&at_campaign=64&at_custom1=%5Bpost+type%5D&at_medium=custom7&at_custom2=twitter

30 years since the demonstration that led to the downfall of Thatcher

Its 30 years since the London poll tax demonstration (31^st March 1990, the last Saturday of the month) that led in November 1990 to the resignation of Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister.

The protest was around 100,000 strong and marched from Kennington to Trafalgar Square (as the Chartists had planned to do on 10^th April 1848, more or less).

It ended in what the media reported as disorder or riot but perhaps because of that gave an impetus to the national campaign that led to the scrapping of the poll tax.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/march/31/newsid_2530000/2530763.stm

Thatcher who was speaking at a gathering of the central council of the Tory Party on the day noted in a private letter (3^rd April 1990) that what had taken place was ‘disgraceful’, still not prepared to grasp the point that the tax was unworkable because numbers would not pay it.

I of course was there but remember little beyond the fact that it was a sunny day and I cleared off to the British Library when the march got to its destination not being a great fan of listening to speeches from politicians who I heard speak quite frequently as it was.

I’ll post some more on the alternative 30^th anniversary of 31^st March itself

Beard Liberation Front

28th March

Contact Keith Flett 07803 167266

Beard of Spring poll not Pointless after Richard Osman joins the shortlist

The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that voting is now open for the coveted Beard of Spring Award.

Co-Presenter of Pointless, Richard Osman has joined the shortlist after he achieved the appropriate quota of write-in votes

Beard of Spring is the second of four seasonal awards that lead to the Beard of the Year in December.

The campaigners say that while the second seasonal award of the year traditionally focuses on new beard growth with Easter so late, the focus is more on those whose beards have appeared in a positive public light during the quarter.

With the cessation of sport because of COVID-19 the list contains rather more sporting beards than usual.

BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, the Beard of Spring poll is clearly far from Pointless

The vote is open now and will close at midday on Good Friday, with the winner announced on Easter Saturday

Beard of Spring 2020

Vaughan Gething, Welsh Health Secretary

Wayne Rooney, footballer

Mikel Arteta, football manager

Alun Wyn Jones, rugby player

Eric Cantona, philosopher

Daniel Norcross, broadcaster

Steve Bell, cartoonist

James Calder, CEO, SIBA

Jeremy Paxman, broadcaster

Roger Waters, musician

Richard Osman, Pointless