Winstanley was born in Wigan in 1609, and can fairly be said to have developed the first communist political movement, in that he advocated the abolition of inequalities in wealth and the equal sharing of resources, especially land. His ideas were very much of the 17th century in that he took his inspiration from the Bible, and the Digger communities that were established, based on his agrarian-communist ideals, were shortlived, lasting only from 1649-1652. (1) But take away the religious bits and his egalitarian ideals have relevance in the 21st century, enough to draw an audience of hundreds to the second Diggers Festival.

It included a symbolic re-enactment in Wigan town centre of the Diggers taking over and cultivating the common land, a showing of the 1975 film "Winstanley", and a series of discussions of the Diggers' politcal ideas. But the biggest part was the peformances by activist poets and musicians, which lasted until after dark. They included established performers like Claire Mooney and Alun Parry, the Liverpool Socialist Choir, plus a newly formed band "Class Actions." These delighted the audience by announcing they had a new single out called "Don't Buy The Sun" [on account of its anti-working class reporting] and handing out copies of said newspaper and inviting people to tear them up. A number of people happily obliged. So I was rather disappointed when I looked them up on Youtube subsequently and found they are promoting the myth that Militant Tendency (now the Socialist Party) singlehandedly started and led the Anti-Poll Tax Campaign - no they didn't, guys! It was a bigger movement than a single political party could have controlled.

What Gerrard Winstanley would have made of it all is any-one's guess. But perhaps he would have recognised the general desire the audience expressed for economic security, an equal share in society's resources, and an equal say in how they are distributed, without obscene amounts of wealth being claimed by the ruling class - in his day, landlords and aristocracy, in ours, bankers and politicians.

(1) There are decent entries about Gerrard Winstanley and The Diggers movement on Wikipedia for anybody who wants to know more.