The Big Issue

The Big Issue is one of Britain’s leading news and cultural magazines. Every week’s edition is packed full of original takes on the biggest issues of the day as well as interviews with the most significant figures in politics and entertainment. The Big Issue was founded 1991 to give people experiencing homelessness the opportunity to earn their own income. We continue to support hundreds of vendors across the UK and all proceeds from sales go to help anyone wanting to lift themselves out of poverty.

THE DISPATCH

The Big Issue

YOUR LETTERS

Nun shall pass

Preventing the inheritance of poverty is the first step to ending homelessness

On with the show • Taylor Swift’s new album has broken her own sales records. On it, she celebrates the life of a showgirl, but is it all glamour beneath the glitter? These showgirls give us a peek under the sequins

Lang Lang • The Chinese pianist has performed for Obama, played with Metallica and is now a global icon. But it took a lot of work

Social housing and the legacy of Thatcher • This week marks the centenary of Margaret Thatcher’s birth. More than 12 years after her death she still casts a massive shadow over the politics, housing and wider society of Britain in 2025. A special investigation by Greg Barradale exposes the shocks to the UK’s local authorities that Right To Buy has left. Professor Stephen Farrall assesses where her policies have carried us, while Grantham reveals details of a festival celebrating its most famous daughter.

Municipalisation can help ease our housing crisis

Part 2 The state we’re in

The lady’s not for bourbon

‘We are milking the reputation of the original milk snatcher for profit and publicity’

The soul for sale: Britain’s real Thatcher legacy

The Gates of Londinium

An old world seen anew

Literary dystopias

Women rule!

‘It’s one of the greatest portraits of America there has ever been’

Unhappy valley

ROBIN INCE IS ON THE ROAD

‘I totally understand why people feel so disheartened’

Puzzles

MY PITCH CRISTIAN, 38 • WAITROSE, MORNINGSIDE, EDINBURGH TUESDAY-SATURDAY 10.30AM-4PM

Big Issue Invest. Proving what was once imagined

20 years 20 people • Here’s who helped Big Issue Invest thrive

SUCCESS STORIES • Merrifield explains what drove him to set up his social enterprise, and how his own story of survival informs the help he’s giving to others like him – with support from Big Issue Invest