Red Clydeside: A history of the labour movement in Glasgow 1910-1932

Cartoons

Cartoon entitled 'The Labour Party rescues the unemployed', 1922

Communist inspired political cartoon satirising the bureacracy of the Labour Party

Political cartoon entitled 'The Labour Party rescues the unemployed' satirising the Labour Party's ineffectiveness in alleviating the plight of the unemployed.

The less than supportive attitude and response of the Labour Party and the trade unions to the plight of the unemployed during the depression years converted many of the unemployed to communism. The communist-controlled National Unemployed Workers Movement agitated for the unemployed and became the main political organisation campaigning for the rights of the unemployed during the depression years.

This cartoon was first published in 1922 in 'The Communist', at that time the weekly organ of the Young Communist Party, which was later that year replaced by the Workers' Weekly as the official organ of the Communist Party of Great Britain.

Source: Gallacher Memorial Library, Glasgow Caledonian University Special Collections and Archives