Michael Lavalette
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Michael Lavalette (born 1962) is a British academic specialising in
social work Social work is an academic discipline and practice-based profession concerned with meeting the basic needs of individuals, families, groups, communities, and society as a whole to enhance their individual and collective well-being. Social wo ...
. Until retirement he was the Everton Professor of Social and Community Engagement at Liverpool Hope University, formerly having worked at both Liverpool and Central Lancashire universities. He is now Emeritus Professor at Liverpool Hope University and a visiting professor at the University of Bethlehem and the University of West Attica, Athens.


Academic career and social work activism

Along with Chris Jones, Iain Feguson, and Laura Penketh, he was an author of the ''Social Work manifesto for a new engaged practice'' and organiser of the Liverpool and Glasgow conferences of the Social Work Action Network (SWAN), which stands in the radical social work tradition and seeks to oppose managerialism and privatisation within the social work profession, and to promote social work practice based on principles of social justice. At the end of 2008 the Social Work Action Network ran a campaign defending social workers in the aftermath of the Baby P tragedy. Shortly after, along with Iain Ferguson, he wrote a polemical pamphlet called 'Social Work After Baby P' that included contributions from academics, practitioners and senior trade union officers.During the COVID pandemic, Lavalette was instrumental in setting up SWANI (Social Work Action Network International) that brought activist groups together from across the globe. In terms of academic output he is the author, joint author or editor of 30 books and pamphlets In March 2021 he was awarded Honorary membership of the Palestinian Writers Union in recognition of his writing on, and activism with, Palestinian groups in Britain and the West Bank


Political activism

Lavalette originally joined his local Labour Party in North Ayrshire at the age of 16 in 1979, but by January 1981 he had left to join the SWP. In the early 1990s he moved to Preston for work and became politically active in the local labour movement. In Preston he was the co-ordinator of the local
Stop the War Coalition The Stop the War Coalition (StWC), informally known simply as Stop the War, is a British group that campaigns against the United Kingdom's involvement in military conflicts. It was established on 21 September 2001 to campaign against the impe ...
. He organised a solidarity day in Preston for victims of the Asian
Tsunami A tsunami ( ; from , ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and underwater explosions (including detonations, ...
and has led campaigns against hospital privatisation,
Islamophobia Islamophobia is the irrational fear of, hostility towards, or hatred against the religion of Islam or Muslims in general. Islamophobia is primarily a form of religious or cultural bigotry; and people who harbour such sentiments often stereot ...
, the wars in the
Middle East The Middle East (term originally coined in English language) is a geopolitical region encompassing the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant, Turkey, Egypt, Iran, and Iraq. The term came into widespread usage by the United Kingdom and western Eur ...
and support for local trade unionists on strike. A common theme in his political work has been solidarity with the Palestinian liberation struggle. He was involved in a campaign to twin Glasgow University with Beir Zeit University in 1982. In 2003, as a councillor, he led a campaign to twin Preston with Nablus. In 2004 he led a delegation of 34 people from Preston to the West Bank, where the group were the last ever international group to meet President Arafat He was first elected as a Socialist Alliance candidate shortly after the
Iraq War The Iraq War (), also referred to as the Second Gulf War, was a prolonged conflict in Iraq lasting from 2003 to 2011. It began with 2003 invasion of Iraq, the invasion by a Multi-National Force – Iraq, United States-led coalition, which ...
began in 2003. In 2007, he was re-elected, this time standing for the
Respect Party The Respect Party was a left-wing to far-left socialist political party active in the United Kingdom between 2004 and 2016. At the height of its success in 2007, the party had one Member of Parliament (MP) in the House of Commons and nineteen ...
. In the Respect split in 2007 he remained loyal to the SWP and broke with George Galloway. In 2007, he led a campaign against academy schools in Preston. In December 2010, Lavalette proposed a motion to Preston City Council calling for opposition to cuts, job losses and privatisations. The motion had the backing of the local trades council and of Preston Against Cuts. Five Labour councillors had voted and spoken in favour of this motion at these meetings. ''Socialist Worker'' reported that when it came to the full council meeting however, all the Labour councillors voted against this motion, and for an amendment supporting 'fairer' cuts backed by the Liberals and Tories. He held his seat until May 2011, when he lost it to Labour. He was re-elected in 2012 as an independent socialist, backed by the SWP. He was active in Unite Against Fascism's campaign against the English Defence League locally. He was affiliated with Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) until he retired from his seat in 2015. In 2018 he left the SWP and joined the revolutionary socialist organisation Counterfire. In 2024, he was active in opposition to Israel's actions in the 2023 Israel-Hamas war. In the General Election in July 2024 he stood as part of the pro-Palestine ‘Independent Network’. During the campaign, he declined to denounce Hamas as a terrorist organization, stating that "when your land is occupied ... people have the right to resist." He came second to Labour, securing just over 21 per cent of the vote. Lavalette regularly contributes to the '' Lancashire Evening Post''.


Electoral history


2003 Local Election

Lavalette stood in the
Preston City Council Elections Preston City Council elections are generally held three years out of every four, with a third of the council elected each time. Preston City Council is the local authority for the non-metropolitan district of City of Preston, Lancashire, Presto ...
: Town Centre Ward 2003 as a Socialist Alliance Against the War candidate. George Galloway was alleged to have backed Michael Lavalette in this election, which was one of the charges that led to George Galloway being expelled from the Labour Party. He came first with 546 votes, 37.81%, unseating the Labour Party, whose candidate Musa Ahmed Jiwa came second with 440 votes. The turnout was 1,444 (28%).


2004 European Election

In 2004 he was the lead candidate in the
Respect Respect, also called esteem, is a positive feeling or deferential action shown towards someone or something considered important or held in high esteem or regard. It conveys a sense of admiration for good or valuable qualities. It is also th ...
list for the 2004 European Election in the
North West England North West England is one of nine official regions of England and consists of the ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial counties of Cheshire, Cumbria, Greater Manchester, Lancashire and Merseyside. The North West had a population of 7,4 ...
region. Respect came ninth, with 24,636 votes (1.2%) and none of its candidates were elected.


2005 General Election

In the
2005 United Kingdom general election The 2005 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 5 May 2005, to elect List of MPs elected in the 2005 United Kingdom general election, 646 members to the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons. The governing Labo ...
, he stood as a Respect candidate in Preston coming fourth with 2,318 votes, 6.8% of the vote, saving his deposit. Labour's Mark Hendrick won with 17,210 votes (50.5%).


2007 Local Election

Lavalette kept his council seat, Preston Town Centre, with 1179 votes (more than 52%) increasing his majority by over 19%.


2011 Local Election

In May 2011 he lost his seat to Labour. He stood as a Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition candidate because the SWP had left Respect in 2007 and since joined TUSC.


2012 Local Election

Lavalette successfully stood as an independent in 2012, again in Town Centre ward.


2024 general election

In March 2024, Blog Preston and Counterfire reported that Lavalette would stand as an independent candidate for Preston in the next general election as a part of the No Ceasefire, No Vote movement. At election hustings organised by the local press in June 2024, candidates were asked if he would denounce
Hamas The Islamic Resistance Movement, abbreviated Hamas (the Arabic acronym from ), is a Palestinian nationalist Sunni Islam, Sunni Islamism, Islamist political organisation with a military wing, the Qassam Brigades. It has Gaza Strip under Hama ...
"as a
terrorist Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of violence against non-combatants to achieve political or ideological aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violence during peacetime or in the context of war aga ...
organisation", he answered no; asked whether he would instead denounce the actions of Hamas on 7 October 2023, he again said no: "You had the right to resist in the
Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
and the
French Resistance The French Resistance ( ) was a collection of groups that fought the German military administration in occupied France during World War II, Nazi occupation and the Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy#France, collaborationist Vic ...
nd alsothe Yugoslav resistance, the Italian resistance, the Greek resistance – and the
Palestinians Palestinians () are an Arab ethnonational group native to the Levantine region of Palestine. *: "Palestine was part of the first wave of conquest following Muhammad's death in 632 CE; Jerusalem fell to the Caliph Umar in 638. The indigenou ...
have the right to fight against their own dispossession... history did not start on October. He referred to attacks on Palestinians, including one in Huwara in 2023 in which he said people were "burnt out ftheir homes": "There’s a context to all this." Writing in June 2024, Lavalette said he had significant support in the Muslim community, but also among white working class people.


Published works

*''The Forgotten Workforce: Scottish Children at Work'' (1991) (Glasgow, Scottish Low Pay Unit) *''Child employment in the capitalist labour market'' (1994) (Aldershot, Ashgate) *''Solidarity on the waterfront: the Liverpool lock out of 1995/96'' (with Jane Kennedy) (1996) (Liverpool, Liver Press) *''Social policy: a conceptual and theoretical introduction'' (edited with Alan Pratt) (1996) (London, Sage) *''Anti-racism and social welfare'' (edited with Laura Penketh and Chris Jones) (1998) (Aldershot, Ashgate) *''A thing of the past?: child labour in Britain in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries'' (editor) (1999) (Liverpool, Liverpool University Press) *''Child labor: a world history companion'' (with Sandy Hobbs and Jim McKechnie) (1999) (New York, ABC-CLIO) *''Class struggle and social welfare'' (edited with Gerry Mooney) (2000) (London, Routledge) *''Social Policy: A conceptual and theoretical introduction (second edition)'' (Edited with Alan Pratt) (2001) (London, Sage) *''Leadership and social movements'' (edited with Colin Barker and Alan Johnson) (Manchester, MUP) (2001) *''Rethinking social welfare: a critical perspective'' (with Iain Ferguson and Gerry Mooney) (2002) (London, Sage) *''Children, welfare and the state'' (edited with Barry Goldson and Jim McKechnie) (2002) (London, Sage) *''A Palestine Journey; Respect For Palestine'' (pamphlet) *''Globalisation, global justice and social work'' (edited with Iain Ferguson and Elizabeth Whitmore) (2005) (London, Sage) *''Social Policy: Theories, concepts and issues (Third Edition)'' (Edited with Alan Pratt) (2006) (London, Sage) *''George Lansbury and the rebel councillors of Poplar'' (foreword by George Galloway) (2006) (London, Bookmarks) *''International Social Work and the Radical Tradition'' (edited with Iain Ferguson) (2007) (Birmingham, Venture Press) *''Social Work After Baby P: Issues debates and Alternative Perspectives''(Edited with Iain Ferguson) (2009) (Liverpool, Liverpool Hope University Press) *''Radical Social Work Today'' (Editor) (2011) (Bristol, Policy Press) *''Social Work in Extremis'' (edited with Vassilios Ioakimidis) (2011) (Bristol, Policy Press) *''Voices From the West Bank'' (with Chris Jones) (2011) (London, Bookmarks) *''Capitalism and Sport: Politics, Protest, People and Play'' (editor) (2013) (London, Bookmarks)


References


External links

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Further reading

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Michael Lavlette quoted on 'Kid Power'
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lavalette, Michael 1962 births Living people British anti-war activists Councillors in Lancashire Respect Party councillors Respect Party parliamentary candidates Socialist Workers Party (UK) members Far-left politicians in the United Kingdom Communism in the United Kingdom