The turbulent Labour Party of the 1980s
The Labour Party in the 1980s saw a stormy civil war that ended in purges as Tony McMahon remembers from a misspent youth
Politics
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It’s a Sin – LGBT in the Thatcher era
The Russell T Davies series It’s a Sin shows what it was like to be young and gay in the 1980s under Margaret Thatcher and with AIDS
LGBT woes in the early 1980s
LGBT people faced discrimination, the AIDS virus and homophobic legislation from the Thatcher government in the 1980s as Tony McMahon reports
Labour MPs leaving in 2019 – and 1981
The departure of the Gang of Four from the Labour Party to form the SDP in 1981 was a big event unlike the exodus of MPs in 2019 such as Chuka Umunna
Grim times for LGBT people in the 1980s
Margaret Thatcher is sometimes presented as a gay icon, but in the 1980s she led an onslaught on LGBT rights at the height of the HIV crisis
The Miners Strike and my student union year
In the academic year 1984-85, I was Deputy President of Liverpool University student union during the miners strike of that year
Build up to the Anti-Nazi League carnival
The Anti-Nazi League Carnival in 1978 was a unique demonstration led by bands like The Clash and TRB against the rising power of the National Front
Tony Benn, Dennis Healey battle for Labour
In 1981, the left and right in the Labour Party clashed when Tony Benn and Dennis Healey ran against eachother to be Deputy Leader
Notting Hill carnival ends in riot
In the late 1970s, every year at the Notting Hill Carnival ended in a riot reflecting poor relations between the Metropolitan Police and black youth
Austerity economics – failure 35 years ago
The 1979 Thatcher government introduced a form of austerity economics called monetarism that ended up being a complete failure