Did anyone seriously imagine that Robert Mugabe would tolerate a democratic Presidential election on 27 June? Having lost the last election, he and his party were never going to risk another defeat.

In March, no amount of poll rigging, intimidation or brutality against opponents could stifle the bravery of Zimbabweans voting against him. For the first time, local election results were posted up in public. For the first time people [...]

Labour has achieved a tremendous amount to accelerate renewable energy. But, despite spending constraints, we will have to do much better in future.

Strong leadership will be needed to overcome obstacles placed in the way of progress by officialdom and by those environmentalists and politicians who parade their green credentials but then oppose practical projects. We need a can-do culture to replace the can't- or won't-do culture around renewable energy [...]

In opposition, the Tories show they know little about dealing with the problems of poverty and worklessness that they helped create when in power. Their response to Labour's radical new approach to welfare, with its emphasis on creating skills, has been to become cheerleaders for the reactionary, discredited Wisconsin model of welfare reform, with its emphasis on unemployment and forcing all who can work into jobs.

As Gordon Brown signalled [...]

Whether on Iraq, health reorganisation, schools reform or civil liberties, the relationship between Labour and millions of progressive voters has become sour and distrustful. It flourished in the mid-1990s and underpinned our landslide victory in 1997. Now fractured, it puts the party's chances of a historic fourth-term victory at risk, allowing the Conservatives back into power.

George Bush's two terms in the White House graphically demonstrate the danger. The Tories, [...]

This has been a cruel summer: first Robin Cook and now Mo Mowlam, two political stars Labour could ill afford to lose. I spoke to Mo just a few weeks ago to tell her about the IRA statement. It was clear that she was ill, but she immediately understood the historic significance of the ending of the conflict and the commitment to democratic and peaceful means.

I told her that [...]

The loss of Robin Cook is devastating for his wife, Gaynor, his family and his friends. But it is also devastating for the Labour Party, its present and its future. Devastating to those countless party members who were inspired by his oratory and his ability to give living passion and energy to socialist values. When he was in the cabinet, people knew they had someone right at the top who [...]

You read it here first. A third Labour term will be about "liveability". Peter Hain is talking about quality-of-life issues such as antisocial behaviour, community policing, public health, housing and childcare. "If the first term focused on economic stability and the second was about public investment, this time our job is to leave a liveability legacy." The Leader of the Commons is planning seven "big reform bills" for straight after [...]

A hundred years after the railway workers helped to establish the Labour Party, their hard-left leader, Bob Crow, wants to sabotage it. But any split with Labour would benefit the Tories, not his members.

In cutting funding to Labour, Crow (not even a member of the party) deliberately insulted John Prescott, a trade unionist for 47 years who was regularly sacked and disciplined for asserting rights that Crow's members can [...]

Globalisation is not a policy. It's a fact of life. There is no point in being afraid of it. Or angry. It is like getting angry about electricity. And, like electricity, the point about globalisation is to harness it to do good, to make sure it generates a safer, fairer, more equal world.

Globalisation means that every country, every organisation, every person has become part of numerous worldwide networks. Trade [...]

I was born in Nairobi and brought up in Pretoria. My parents fought for freedom in South Africa, and I carried on fighting for that freedom through the Anti-Apartheid Movement after they had been forced to leave and we came to London.

In Soweto in April 1994, I stood at dawn watching people voting for the first time in their lives, the queue stretching far out of sight. "Is [...]