Oxford University Labour Club (OULC) was founded in 1919 to provide a voice for Labour Party values and for socialism and social democracy at Oxford University, England. It is the largest and oldest university Labour club in the country.
The club caters for any students who are interested in the ideals of the labour movement whether a lifelong member of the Labour Party or entirely new to politics. Stewart Wood, special adviser to Gordon Brown and politics tutor at Magdalen College, said that 'OULC is held up as an exemplar of what needs to be done.' During his visit to Oxford in July 2009 the Prime Minister Gordon Brown was reported as having praised OULC’s 'brilliant contribution to progressive politics in the University, the city and the country.' The club was instrumental in returning Andrew Smith to Parliament for Oxford East at the 2010 General Election with a 4.1% swing to Labour, the largest in England outside London.
OULC holds regular speaker events, social events, topical discussions and takes part in year-round campaigning activity, in the student movement for the Labour Party and on issues decided by the membership. In recent years, the club has hosted a number of high-profile figures from the Labour movement including Tony Benn, David Miliband, Ed Miliband, Andrew Adonis, Neil Kinnock, Lord Falconer, Alastair Campbell, Harriet Harman, Jeremy Corbyn, John Denham, Stephen Twigg, David Blunkett, Brendan Barber, Derek Simpson, Nick Cohen, Tessa Jowell and Jack Straw.
In the past, it produced a termly magazine called Look Left which has gone online-only as of 2012 and can be found here: http://lleft.blogspot.co.uk/. It hosts an annual John Smith Memorial Dinner and has recently added an annual Barbara Castle Memorial Lecture.
Read more about Oxford University Labour Club: Constitution and Organisation
Famous quotes containing the words oxford university, oxford, university, labour and/or club:
“During the first formative centuries of its existence, Christianity was separated from and indeed antagonistic to the state, with which it only later became involved. From the lifetime of its founder, Islam was the state, and the identity of religion and government is indelibly stamped on the memories and awareness of the faithful from their own sacred writings, history, and experience.”
—Bernard Lewis, U.S. Middle Eastern specialist. Islam and the West, ch. 8, Oxford University Press (1993)
“The greatest gift that Oxford gives her sons is, I truly believe, a genial irreverence toward learning, and from that irreverence love may spring.”
—Robertson Davies (b. 1913)
“Fowls in the frith,
Fishes in the flood,
And I must wax wod:
Much sorrow I walk with
For best of bone and blood.”
—Unknown. Fowls in the Frith. . .
Oxford Book of Short Poems, The. P. J. Kavanagh and James Michie, eds. Oxford University Press.
“We have much studied and much perfected, of late, the great civilized invention of the division of labour; only we give it a false name. It is not, truly speaking, the labour that is divided; but the men.”
—John Ruskin (1819–1900)
“Women ... are completely alone, though they were born and bred upon this soil, as if they belonged to another class in creation.”
—“Jennie June” Croly 1829–1901, U.S. founder of the woman’s club movement, journalist, author, editor. F, Demorest’s Illustrated Monthly Mirror of Fashions, pp. 363-4 (December 1870)