A NEW all-party parliamentary group for political literacy is “no substitute” for labour-movement political education, socialists warned yesterday.

The new group, co-chaired by Conservative MP Simon Fell and Labour peer Iain McNicol – notorious on the left for apparently working to undermine former leader Jeremy Corbyn while party general secretary, according to an internal report leaked last Easter — is pushing for more political education in schools.

It points to low turnouts by young people in elections, with the “youthquake” of 2017, when Labour attracted large numbers of first-time voters, not reflected in the 2019 general election.

Marx Memorial Library education committee chair Professor John Foster said the group was a “welcome development” but noted that the government had recently issued instructions to schools not to use anti-capitalist material.

“Almost all the rights we enjoy today, the right to vote, to be in a trade union, were won politically by organisations which had the objective of socialism and ending capitalism,” he said, calling on the all-party group to demand the government reverse its advice.

Joe Guinan of the Political Education Project (PEP), an online “socialist Sunday school” launched this month, said: “The state isn’t going to equip young people to challenge its narratives and self-justifications.

“There is no substitute for independent self-education for change by working-class people for working-class people.”

Former Crewe & Nantwich MP Laura Smith, also a PEP steering group member, said: “Empowering people to be able to understand the world politically in order to change it is about so much more than parliamentary politics. Trade unionism has to be front and centre.

“We must not only learn from our history but be able to think outside the rigid political system we currently have. This is why PEP is so important and we would be happy to work alongside others to ensure political education is delivered in a meaningful way.”