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Tolpuddle, virtual and physical
Dorset’s famous labour movement festival might have been forced online this year due to coronavirus, but online activism does have its upsides, says KEITH FLETT
Tolpuddle Martyrs tree

THE annual Tolpuddle Martyrs’ Festival was this year of necessity held virtually, like much but not all labour movement and radical activity since March.

Yet many of the lessons to be drawn from the men of Tolpuddle apply just as much to the virtual world of politics and organising as they do to the physical one.

I agree with the historian Tom Scriven that the Martyrs had a significant back story. 

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