I have been centrally involved in three attempts to create a new – or in one case, renewed – media for the Left in London. Two failed and one succeeded.
In 1971-1972, 7 DAYS was a revolutionary photojournalism weekly that lasted six months (historic months that included the first miners’ strike, Bloody Sunday in Northern Ireland, Nixon’s trip to China and a massive Vietnamese assault on their American occupiers) before it folded.
In 1986, I pitched for a transformative editorship of the New Statesman. I was supported by a star-studded team, and proposed a new format. Neil Kinnock, then leader of the Labour Party, was involved in preventing this.
