“This is my truth, tell me yours.”
Thus spoke Bevan. This is a blog which will be looking at issues from a Bevanite perspective. Proudly socialist, trade union orientated, & working-class focused.
There are also a number of recurring articles planned around aspects of the Left (including ephemera and campaign materials). We will have interviews with a range of people from across the labour movement (well those that will talk to me…) and there is scope for those interviews to be made available in the form of a podcast in addition to those published on this website.
As for why I have orientated this blog around Bevan I can only say that like many others I have a long standing respect and admiration for Aneurin Bevan going back to my younger days. Bevan was instrumental in fashioning the NHS into being in the teeth of rabid opposition. While rightly lauded for his work in health there were other strings to his bow. Bevan’s work on house building, on internationalism, and industrial matters warrants closer inspection.
I am of course keenly aware that nothing quite screams ‘relevance’ to the twenty-first century like a mid-twentieth century politician born in the nineteenth. Bevan is not without reproach (both sides of the Nuclear Weapons debate can point to him as a fervent supporter) but his principles and his actions are worthy of discussion.
By way of background I am a trade unionist with over a decade’s worth of standing with the GMB. In that time I have been a Union Rep, Chair of GMB Young Members Network, and Secretary of Cardiff Trades Council.
An inveterate union conference attendee I have written and spoken on motions ranging from supporting a real living wage, investing in public libraries, and combating the far right. I have been a member of the Labour Party since 2014 and have represented GMB twice at Labour Party Conference speaking on the plight of care workers and the dearth of affordable housing. I have seldom made a speech without referencing Bevan.
Anuerin Bevan was a Socialist, a Trade Unionist, and a Labour activist and the three were woven into one tradition. I endeavour to stand in that tradition. From all that I have read, heard, and experienced I believe it is that socialist tradition that offers the solution to the capitalist malaise in which we find ourselves. For what is socialism if not that curious distaste for the suffering of others and the resolve with which to change it? That is my truth which I wish to tell.
This is why I am here. This is why I believe we need to talk about Bevan.
