Fiona Lali and Jonas Marvin mark 90 years since Cable Street & explore what lies ahead for left resistance to the far right today

We're delighted to be joined by our guest speakers at this special event, marking 90 years since the Battle of Cable Street, and celebrating the publication of a new edition of the classic book Our Flag Stays Red.

On 4 October 1936, East London’s working class and minority communities stood shoulder to shoulder on Cable Street and stopped Oswald Mosley’s British Union of Fascists from marching through the East End. Dockers, tailors, Jewish and Irish families, communists and trade unionists built barricades and held the line. The day still stands as one of the defining moments of anti-fascist resistance in Britain.

The far right is on the rise again, and the left is asking where its future lies. With the Green Party drawing in many who once marched under red banners, the evening will ask:

Does the flag still stay red, or is it turning green too?

How do we carry that anti-fascist legacy into the present?

What will it take to build that kind of united, organised resistance today?

The evening takes its name from Phil Piratin’s Our Flag Stays Red, a first-hand account of Cable Street and the East End communist movement of the 1930s. It is the Left Book Club’s book of the month for November. Copies will be available to buy on the night, or become a Left Book Club member today (https://leftbookclub.com/join/) and receive the book through the post.

Drinks will be available on the night, including wine, beer and non-alcoholic options.

Speakers

Fiona Lali is a revolutionary communist and campaigner with the Revolutionary Communist Party who stood in Stratford & Bow at the 2024 general election, and came to national attention after challenging Suella Braverman over Palestine on live television.

Jonas Patrick Marvin is the author of The Breaking of the English Working Class, cohosts the Life of the Party podcast and blogs at Marx’s Dream Journal.

Hosted by Elif Sarican, Education Manager at the Left Book Club.

Join us in the East End to remember Cable Street and to ask how we turn its memory into organised resistance now.

Description supplied by the event organiser.