A new historical and political discussion group, the Mary Quaile Club, will hold its first meeting on 15 February 2014 in Salford at 2pm, at the Cornerstones Community Centre, 451 Liverpool Street, Langworthy, Salford M6 5QQ.
The theme of the meeting will be “What Ever Happened to the Welfare State?” The event is free. The speakers will be Paula Bartley and Hugh Caffrey
Paula Bartley will discuss the life and politics of Ellen Wilkinson. Paula is the author of Ellen Wilkinson, from Red Suffragist to Government Minister, to be published by Pluto Press in February 2014.
Ellen grew up in Manchester and was an active socialist and suffragist. She was a Manchester City councillor for a short time before becoming a Labour MP for Middlesbrough and later Jarrow. . In 1936 she took part in the Jarrow Crusade, a march of the unemployed to London. In 1945 the Labour party won a landslide victory and set up the NHS and welfare State. Ellen became Minister of Education. She died suddenly in 1947.
Hugh Caffrey is Secretary of Greater Manchester Keep our NHS Public, which campaigns against the privatisation of the NHS. He will outline what is happening at the moment and explain what people can do to save the NHS from being taken over by the private sector.
The Mary Quaile Club was set up in December 2013. It will hold regular discussions on working class history and its links with the political issues facing working people in Tory Britain e.g. bedroom tax, zero hours contracts, privatisation of the NHS etc. The Club takes its name from the Manchester trade unionist, Mary Quaile
More information please visit the website: http://maryquaileclub.wordpress.com or email: maryquaileclub@gmail.com or find the project on Twitter: @maryquaileclub