Marxist. Trade Unionist. Socialist-feminist. Author. Poet. Speaker. Tutor. RMT ex-Exec. Workers' Liberty. Autie. Bi. PUFC fan.
The 1921 rebellion in Poplar, east London, when thirty Labour councillors went to prison rather than cut services or increase rates.
Janine will tell the story of one of Holloway prison's former residents at this event to mark the seventh anniversary of the prison's closure and promote proposals for a progressive Women's Building in its place.
Venue: entrance to HMP Holloway, Parkhurst Road, London N7 0NU.
… and why it matters today
By Janine Booth, published in RMT News.
The two biggest employers in the east London borough of Poplar one hundred years were the railways and the docks. Our forerunner unions had plenty of members there. Their jobs involved long hours and low pay, but they were unionised, so they were fighting for, and winning, improvements.
In 2011, Janine spoke at an event hosted (and filmed) by Reel News, about the Poplar Rates Rebellion.
This information panel (picture), written by Janine, has been posted by Tower Hamlets Council to accompany the newly-renovated Hale Street mural, which pays tribute to the Poplar councillors. The text is below.
After the ‘Great War’, London’s East Enders lived in extreme poverty.
Today (1 September 2021) is the centenary of the first arrests of Poplar's rebel councillors.
More about this auspicious occasion and its relevance today in my article on Labour Hub.
A century ago, in August 1921, Labour Councillor Jack Wooster told crowds demonstrating in support of Poplar's rebel councillors that "Sympathy without relief [the name back then for welfare benefits] is like mustard without beef".
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Sympathy without relief
is like mustard without beef
or lettuce without leaf
One hundred years ago, a big movement grew in the east London borough of Poplar, headed by thirty councillors who went to prison rather than levy extortionate rates or cut services to the working-class population that elected them. ‘Poplarism’ won.
Why did Poplar win? Here are ten key points, which contain lessons for today.
Published in Solidarity 588, 14 April 2021
Long before ‘Black Friday’ became the name for the first day of the Christmas shopping season, it was the name that the labour movement gave to the day on which trade union leaders inflicted a defeat on their own movement. It happened exactly one hundred years ago, on 15 April 1921.
Published by Women's Fightback 25, Winter/Spring 2021
Our story is set just after the first world war in Poplar, an east London borough with a population of 160,000 people crammed into the docklands in the bend of the River Thames (Poplar) and the area just north of it (Bow).
Janine gave this illustrated online talk about the Poplar Rates Rebellion for the TUC Tolpuddle Radical History School on 12 January 2021.