Renewal (Journal)

Renewal is a New Labour friendly journal set up by lobbyist Neal Lawson

Nina Temple is on the board of the New Labour journal Renewal, which was housed in Tim Bell’s offices (Bell attended a planning meeting with Thatcher and Brian Crozier) and editor Neal Lawson worked for Lowe Bell before starting LLM, one of the New Labour Lobbyist companies exposed by Greg Palast’s 'Lobbygate' secrets-for-cash scandal. A great deal of the impetus for Demos came from the PR Lobbying ‘industry’. [1]

From the Lawrence and Wishart website:

Renewal is a quarterly journal unashamedly committed to political modernisation. The issue facing party members is what form modernisation should take now that we have successfully reconnected with the electorate.

Renewal is in broad agreement with leadership but is keen that the opportunity for a more ambitious and radical agenda is pursued. This is important both to help ensure that we win the next election and so that we use that historic second term to deliver the kind of progressive transformation of our society and economy that matches our democratic socialist ideals. There are three basic pillars to the kind of 'left modernisation' that Renewal broadly supports:

• An economic policy that is primarily egalitarian
• A social policy that is liberal
• A political system that is pluralist

Tony Blair has given Renewal great support. In return we offer him critical, constructive dialogue about the ideas and policies necessary to transform Britain.

Renewal now has the critical resources, and the reputation and base in new Labour (the editorial advisory board includes Tony Blair, Robin Cook, Clare Short and David Miliband), to provide the kind of thoughtful contribution that will enable its readers to be at the heart of the debates on new Labour's strategy and performance in government.

In the recent past you could have read in Renewal: Tony Blair on Labour's political purpose after the election; Robin Cook on 21st century radicalism; Judith Church on the new women MPs; Geoff Mulgan, Carey Oppenheim and Andrew Gamble on Labour strategy; and European perspectives from the German SPD, Sweden's social democrats and the Italian government's left coalition.

EDITORIAL BOARD

Editor: Paul Thompson Deputy Editor: Sue Goss Managing Editor: Neal Lawson Reviews Editor: Alan MacDougall Website Manager: Gavin Hayes Associate Editors: Fiona Mactaggart, Stuart Thomson, David Halpern, Phil Larkin, Stewart Wood, Sally Davison, Gerry Hassan, Gavin Kelly Former Associate editors Paul du Gay, Caroline Flint

Editorial Advisory Board

• Lord Bassam,
• Tony Blair (MP),
• Robin Cook (MP),
• Caroline Flint MP
• Anthony Giddens (LSE)
• Patricia Hewitt MP
• Prof Paul Hirst (Birkbeck College)
• Margaret Hodge MP
• Prof Bob Jessop (Lancaster University)
• Alan Johnson MP
• Ruth Kelly MP
• Prof Ernesto Laclau (Essex University)
• Mark Lazarowicz
• Prof David Marquand
• Alan Milburn MP
• David Miliband
• John Monks (TUC)
• David Pitt Watson
• Anita Pollack
• Prof David Robertson (Liverpool John Moores University)
• Prof Michael Rustin (University of East London)
• Prof Martin Shaw (Sussex University)
• Clare Short MP
• Matthew Taylor (Director, IPPR)
• Nina Temple
• Prof Sally Tomlinson (Oxford University)
• Carol Tongue
• Tony Wright MP

Find out more about Renewal at [2]