Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent

Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.

Baroness Castle critical of Tony Blair's leadership

Colin Brown
Tuesday 16 July 1996 23:02 BST
Comments

Your support helps us to tell the story

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

Your support makes all the difference.

Tony Blair was accused of running Labour like a "one-party state", by a veteran former Cabinet minister, with a warning that the Labour leadership will face a major challenge over its manifesto pledges on pensions at this year's annual party conference. Baroness Castle, the 85-year-old Labour peer, is going on the warpath to stop the party abandoning the manifesto commitment on which it fought the last election, to raise pensions by pounds 5 for single pensioners and pounds 8 a week for couples with restoration of the pensions link with earnings through State Earnings Related Pensions.

A fiery campaigner and Social Services Secretary in the Wilson government, who introduced SERPs, Baroness Castle will be seeking to mobilise support in the constituencies to have the manifesto voted on line by line at the party conference.

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in