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Not much time to blog earlier as this was how the day went after lunch 3pm - meeting with EOC 4pm - meeting at party HQ to discuss a forthcoming press event 5.15 - popped in to POlice Federation meeting to say hi to the guy from Hampshire and find out hot issues 5.30 - Parliamentary party meeting (shortest on record) 6.00 - meeting with Hampshire person on independent police complaints

Today was the annual lunch and Guest of Honour was Princess Anne. I wasn't sure how much she knows about science but was aware that she is involved with WISE (Women into Science and Engineering). Clearly Lord Soulsby, when introducing her, was also struggling to pad out the scientific CV and mentioned how well qualified she was etc and mentioned some role that the Princess has in The Society of

Wonderful. Tonight's News at 10 O'Clock on BBC1 has led with the story of the release of secret Treasury papers about Black Wednesday. John Major has attempted to put a spin on this revelation, by claiming that the cost of £3.3bn was much less than had been estimated. Politically, the precise cost is no longer relevant. What matters is that everyone has just been reminded of the day when

Ignorance is a wonderful thing. It alone can supply the power to defy reality. The consensus among most Tory and Labour politicians, and the braying tabloid-reading masses, is that there is too much immigration. It turns out that there is probably nowhere near enough. Vladimir Spidla, the EU's employment and social affairs commissioner, said in an interview with Reuters that the EU's active

Yesterday we finally debated the heated issue of horse passports, so naturally the jokes and the puns flew around like confetti. David Cornock has already got in before me in asking how we are going to get the horse in the photo-booth so we will trot gracefully on to report the contributions of others. The questions that were on my mind revolved around the impact of these proposals on the price of catfood and how some classic films might have had to be re-made if passports were in place at the time. Police would have been able to ...

The one Assembly Member who always comments to me when I include him in a blog entry is Carl Sargeant, the Labour member for Alyn and Deeside. Carl is a very pleasant person who likes to effect a larger-than-life image. He seems to consider a mention here as a form of trophy. Yesterday, I accused him of going out of his way to be quoted, so frequent were the bloggable comments that he came out with in the chamber. First off was the Business Statement: Carl Sargeant: You will not get doom and gloom from me, ...

Roger Williams, the personable MP for Brecon and Radnorshire, has launched his new website. I looked long and hard but I could not find a blog. Oh, well, maybe when he has more time after being re-elected.

Yesterday's Hansard carries a full report of the Commons' decision to suspend Jonathan Sayeed for two weeks. Sayeed himself made a distinctly Vicky Pollard apology, and this was followed by a headmasterly contribution from Sir George Young, the chairman of the Committee on Standards and Privileges, which set out the facts of the case. Note particularly his comment that: The Committee on Standards and Privileges will need to reflect on whether he has responded fully to our recommendations that he apologise fully to the House in the light of some of his qualifications.

This story says: Even Mr Allawi's party website in Arabic said that that the interim Prime Minister wanted a staged withdrawal of the US forces. I understand that he says something different in English. Meanwhile the results are delayed Still it looks like 169 (Shi'a main list) will come top followed by 130 (PUK KDP alliance). The most ironic element is that it appears that the US's

One of yesterday's Guardian crossword clues had me stumped (well, most of them did, but there is a point this...). The clue was, roughly, "Fifth-rate celebrities around (for instance) John Donne (7)." I resorted eventually to Googling "John Donne" since I had no idea who he was. The first result revealed him to be a poet. Another result contained one of his works which, given the title of this