A statue of Queen Victoria stands before the Council House (1879) on Victoria Square in Birmingham, England. As someone who has had a minor interest in political developments in Birmingham over the past couple of months, I have been appalled at the way that national politicians in some parties have issued instructions to their local counterparts as to how to vote and what to do. I have been equally appalled that some local politicians have kowtowed to these bully boy tactics. The background is that the Labour Party went into the local elections with 61 seats out of 101 and ...
Last week Ed Davey gave a well received keynote speech advocating a new Growth and Defence Partnership ('Partnership') with the European Union (EU) at the European Movement UK's event marking the tenth anniversary of the 2016 Brexit referendum. For many members, having and making a clear overarching national message to complement our local strengths is long overdue. This became apparent in the 7 May local elections. Although we gained more council seats for the eighth time in a row, our national vote share was 2% down on last year's 16%. In my part of the world and elsewhere, it was ...
Iran The Iran War has forced American motorists to reconsider long road trips. At the same time a farmer in Kenya is facing a drastic drop in his $2,200 income and a Sri Lankan construction worker in Dubai is worrying about how his wife and children would survive without his remittances. The Iran War has been little more than an inconvenience for most people in the West. For those in the developing world it was—still is – a matter of life and death. The people in the developing world were already reeling from the effects of cuts in foreign aid, ...
"Wes Streeting was always meant to be their Labour prime minister. The plan, hatched by a tiny clique of right-wing faction fighters, was this: find a candidate on whom they could fake a continuation Corbynism project to win the leadership. Then kick the ladder away from the people who backed them and the promises they made. At the next general election, given the scale of the Tory majority after 2019, get Labour back in the ring with more MPs and then hand over to Streeting. The real grown ups would then be in charge and the subsequent election would be ...
This week, Lib Dem MPs raised some very good questions in Parliament. Andrew George: The Secretary of State says she is looking at options and that she wishes to work in partnership in the international sphere. She must accept that the UK has significant history and responsibility in this region. Does she not listen to the words of her Back Benchers? It is incumbent on her to take action now—not simply to look at things and to seek partnership—to have real effect on this appalling, continuing outrage. Calum Miller: The prospect of a two-state solution rests on at least two ...
Fire was included on The Jimi Hendrix Experience's 1967 album Are You Experienced. Under the title Let Me Light Your Fire, it was released as a single in 1970. Wikipedia, citing Harry Shapiro's book Jimi Hendrix: Electric Gypsy, tells the story behind it: Despite its sexual overtones, the song had an innocuous origin. Noel Redding, bass player for the Experience, invited Hendrix to his mother's house on a cold New Year's Eve in Folkestone, England, after a performance. Hendrix asked Noel's mother if he could stand next to her fireplace to warm himself. She agreed, but her German Shepherd was ...
Economics and 'national security' often pull in different directions. This is especially true when we look at relations with China. Consider the strange case of the Scottish wind turbine project. At the end of March, the UK government blocked a planned Chinese investment in the Scottish Highlands to manufacture wind turbines on 'national security' grounds. The issue got lost in the fog around the Scottish parliamentary elections. But it hasn't gone away. The Chinese have indicated that they will switch the plant from Scotland to Spain. The British partners who spent years negotiating the project, in good faith, are furious ...
Lib Dem HQ has decided to stop making an effort in unpromising Westminster by-elections. Regular guest poster Augustus Carp argues that they've got it wrong. Today I want us to think about a rather unusual chap called Ian Stuart - he was the "area manager" or whatever it was called of the Liberal Party in the Home Counties in the 1980s. On our rare meetings I found him to be a rather genial cove, although I gather he was not always popular with the party hierarchy. Anyway, it was his lot to be the Liberal Party candidate in the long-forgotten ...
One of Petula Clark's early films in her child star days was Trouble at Townsend, which was based on a short story by this blog's hero Malcolm Saville. In her memoirs Is That You, Petula? she briefly remembers making the film: Rather less glamorously, around the same time I made an educational film for children called Trouble at Townsend. It was about a city boy and girl going to the countryside and having adventures. The little boy in the film with me put on weight and got too plump for his costume. We filmed some of it on a farm, ...
America will survive the Iran War. It has survived worse. Israel may not be so fortunate. Superpowers can afford mistakes. Small countries living in dangerous neighbourhoods cannot. People have been predicting the decline of American power since Vietnam. America lost in Vietnam, failed in Iraq and Afghanistan, and suffered humiliation in Somalia. Yet the United States remains the world's dominant military and financial power. Superpowers can absorb defeats. They possess strategic depth. Of course, the same may not be said about individual politicians. Donald Trump has been seriously weakened inside and outside MAGA world. So have the Republican politicians who ...
If you want a night out in Swansea, you go to Wind Street (pronounced Wine Street), where a large number of pubs and restaurants have set up shop on what is now a largely pedestrian street as pictured above. But it hasn't always been like as this website makes clear: Wind Street (Wyne Street in 1567) follows virtually the same line as it did in medieval times. It is likely that several of its buildings, in all or in part date from these times. Its curve follows that of the Tawe. Along with Butter Street (now St Mary Street), Castle ...
