leaving the Labour party

Random interviews with present and past members of the Labour party

'I like to read The Sun in the loo
Its quite a lot of fun
And if a bit later
I run out of paper
I can use it to wipe my bum.'
- Steve, on a bus from London to leaflet against Tony Blair.

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A very small, elderly, wide-faced, elfin-looking man with bat-wing ears sits near the front of a bus that is heading north from London to an anti-war event. The old man looks like Mickey and Wayne Rooney. He says he is a great-nephew of Noel Coward. His name is Michael Coward. Until recently, he was a committed member of the Brentford and Isleworth branch of the Labour Party and had been for many years. He contributed a lot of money to the Labour party over the years (he was a butcher, and made a lot of money out of his successful business in West London) and he leafleted and campaigned for the party for most of his working life. He was a regular branch delegate at Labour party conferences. 'You don't have to be without money to be a socialist,' he says. 'I did make a lot of money and I can retire and travel a lot now, but I always belonged to the Labour party.'