Manchester Evening News and an oddment

Since the war the Socialist Party of Great Britain has contested the 1945 (1 candidate), 1950 (2), 1959 (1), 1964 (2) and 1966 (2) General Elections as well as four by-elections. We feel that this justifies our claim to be a serious political party and to be treated as such. For a time the papers used to describe our candidates as “Independents” when reporting results. After our protests this practice has now died, out as far as the national dailies are concerned but it still appears to exist in some provincial backwaters.

In reporting the results of the last election the Manchester Evening News described our candidate in Hampstead as an “Independent”. A member living in Manchester immediately wrote to the editor pointing out this mistake only to get the reply that “we classify all sorts of ‘oddments’ under the general title of “Ind.” Our comrade wrote again. This time the reply suggested that a news agency was responsible. The matter was then taken up by our Executive Committee.

As it appeared that the news agency had in fact ’referred to us not as “Ind” but as “SPGB” a letter was sent to the editor of the Manchester Evening News demanding a correction. The letter for publication read:

“When publishing the General Election results on 1st April you stated that H. Baldwin was an Independent in the London Constituency of Hampstead. This, of course, was not correct. Mr. Baldwin stood as a candidate for the Socialist Party of Great Britain (the SPGB), an old established political Party, founded in 1904 and is, in fact, the only Socialist Party in this country”.

The letter was published on 8 June minus the “of course” and the last eleven words.