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I attended three meetings today (as well as other campaigning issues). One was a meeting at Sheldon Heath Arts College. One of the issues that came up was school dinners. It was clear that the Labour representative had no practical proposals for improving school dinners. The next meeting was a review with parties of the plans for the election from the Returning Officer. Although things are

By Douglas Adams Just came back from seeing the film version, and wow! A lot of people (most notably Planet Magrethea) as not being true to the books/radio/TV and quite frankly, bull. Who cares, every version has been different and whilst the additions aren't brilliant, it's still a fantastic film. The way the Guide itself is introduced is great (using Journey of the sorcerer - the Hitchhikers theme), making the Book the 'hero' of the film. Martin Freeman fits well into the role of everyman Arthur Dent (although at first the performance will probably jar with most Hitchhikers' fans) and ...

This seems a good time to point you towards this quotation from Francis Wheen on my other blog Serendib.

The Prime Minister's mantra rebounds on him as a poll in today's Independent reveals a dramatic slump in support for Labour among teachers. More than half of those who voted for the party in 2001 said they would not support it this time - with most of them switching to the Liberal Democrats. As Simon Titley also notes two separate polls published today by The Times Higher Education Supplement reveal that a majority of students and academics plan to vote Liberal Democrat as well. Support for the Liberal Democrats among teachers and students has rocketed, a new poll finds. ...

We go back to the Shropshire Star for: Floods at knee height as torrents flow

One of my favourite books of recent months in Matthew Sweet's Shepperton Babylon , which I reviewed here earlier. (I also quoted Gilbert Adair's review of it on my anthology blog Serendib.) Now it has another admirer. Daniall Quinn has written a full and favourable review of it on his blog The Obscurer - with the added interest that he was a schoolfriend of Sweet's.

At the height of the Watergate scandal, the two Washington Post journalists, Woodward and Bernstein, were repeatedly given hints by a Washington insider- whose code name was Deep Throat- as to the nature and scale of the crimes committed by the Nixon Administration. Sometimes, this election I have thought that I know what Woodward and Bernstein must have felt. Dissident Labour members have given hints, and sometimes more than hints, about major disagreements in the Labour ranks about the conduct of the campaign. One friendly face contacted me early this morning revealing that at least some of these problems are ...

In March we quoted some little-known lines of G. K. Chesterton: But we are the people of Cleobury Mortimer, and we never have spoken yet.Mock at us, pay us, pass us; but do not quite forget.Well they have spoken now. The Shropshire Star reports: Banner-waving protesters have persuaded councillors to block plans to build 102 new homes in Cleobury Mortimer in a victory for people power. Angry residents armed with banners stating "Enough is Enough" and "Locals Know Best" made their feelings of opposition clear at a meeting yesterday of South Shropshire District Council's development control committee. And following ...

For as long as anyone can remember, the business lobby has always complained about there being too much 'red tape'. It likes to paint a picture of British industry struggling under an enormous burden of onerous regulation and punitive corporate taxation.It's a refrain that was traditionally repeated only by the Tories until New Labour jumped on the bandwagon. More recently, the Liberal Democrats seem to have endorsed this world view. In 2003, the party approved a green paper tendentiously titled "Setting business free" and its economic spokesmen have sometimes sounded more like Rotary Club bores than Liberal Democrats. But is ...

The Assembly chamber was nearly deserted yesterday as virtually the entire Plaid Cymru group took themselves off to attend Gwynfor Evans' funeral. In addition the three Tory Parliamentary candidates were also missing, presumably campaigning. In general these absenses were unremarked upon until Labour AM, Carl Sargeant, waded in with both feet and delivered that day's crass remark: Carl Sargeant: This is an important issue for Members on this side of the Chamber, and it is disappointing that neither the Conservative nor the Plaid Cymru delegation on health is here to question you this afternoon. I actually thought ...

3 weeks in and this week I'm finally handed a leaflet. A home-county-accented 20 something handed me a brief description of why Nader Fekri, LibDem candidate for Keighley, opposed the war in iraq. On the back there's a description of him (full marks for his causes - Amnesty, medecins sans frontieres, NSPCC), below a description of a LibDem bigwig from the house of lords who's visiting Keighley that afternoon. As this has been the biggest that any party has attempted to influence me - so I will be delighted to vote him EXCEPT - I'm not ...

Lawrie Quinn says he is backing local business but where is his election address printed? Bradford, which last time I looked wasn't in the Scarborough and Whitby constituency. The Conservative Robert Goodwill doesn't say anything about local business in his: good job, since his leaflet came off the presses in Newcastle upon Tyne. Not even Yorkshire. Disloyal, Robert, disloyal. Lib Dem Tania Exley-Moore's? Printed by Adverset, Scarborough, and a superb job they made of designing them, too. The County Council candidates for this ward show a similar pattern: the Labour Party's Dalton Peake went to Wakefield (75 miles as ...

The Western Mail reports that Tory candidate David Davies has accused unnamed rivals of running a dirty tricks campaign against him in the close-run contest for Monmouth after the market town was plastered with illegal posters overnight. Apparently, scores of posters, urging voters to back Mr Davies, had been put up illegally on shop fronts, bus shelters and bins across Monmouth.David has branded it a "deliberate attempt to blacken our name". He demanded the "culprit or culprits" be found and punished but declined to say who he thought was responsible.Mr Davies said, "We condemn this sort of deliberate vandalism ...

Having been a civil servant myself I know what a valuable job that they do. I also know that in many cases the work does not just involve shuffling paper. Sometimes being at the sharp end can be quite an experience as is illustrated in this article:A LAPDANCER called Peaches stripped off for a customer who slipped £20 in her G-string - unaware he was an undercover government investigator.Julieanne Beecher earned up to £300 a week dancing for businessmen at the same time as claiming state benefits.And a DSS fraud detective was sent on a secret mission to mingle with ...

Today's Independent reports an opinion poll showing that most teachers will be voting Liberal Democrat. And more than half the teachers who voted Labour last time are switching to the Lib Dems.The report also includes this teaser about two further polls:Two separate polls published today by The Times Higher Education Supplement reveal that a majority of students and academics plan to vote Liberal Democrat next Thursday.The story is elaborated here:Some 47 per cent of students have decided to back the Lib Dems, compared to 23 per cent opting for Labour and 22 per cent for the Conservatives, the Times Higher ...

I keep forgetting to write things as I go through. I went to watch Leicester City vs Derby County on Tuesday. I took my usual seat in the Fosse Kop Stand, and really enjoyed watching us play the best football of the season. Tremendous 1-0 result! We are NOT going down with the Forest! I made sure my local Lib Dems knew I would not be campaigning on that night, and I wouldn't have missed it

There are times when I think I should rename this blog, "I read the Guardian so you don't have to".Today's edition, however, has an outstanding article by Timothy Garton Ash on how Michael Howard has denied his immigrant heritage and the trouble this denial would cause were he to succeed.In order that Britain should continue to be a place where the children of immigrants can rise to the highest places in the land, in order that thousands of future Michael Howards should be able to succeed, it is necessary for this Michael Howard now to fail.Although the one immigrant I'd ...

This post expresses the anger that many feel after the leak of the A-G's advice, and the mendacious statement of the PM that the Attorney-General's advice was 'unequivocal'.

Don't believe the Labour scare stories. You get what you vote for

One's the new Iraqi PM, the other a former Cabinet member, but can you tell which is which?

Lawrie Quinn (ibid) commented on local live radio that Brian Sedgemore defected because Tony Blair refused him a peerage, whereas Charles Kennedy promised to pony up a seat on the red benches. He'd better be right, to say such things.

As many people know, I have long standing connections with Central and Eastern Europe. This arose from my becoming involved with dissident organizations such as Charter 77 in Czechoslovakia (as it was then) and Solidarnosc in Poland during the 1980s. My career path then seemed to be destined towards obscure academia. However by 1988 the processes of change in the region were coming to fulfillment and I was approached to join a research unit in the City. After the 1989 year of miracles, which saw the election of Tadeusz Mazowiecki as the the first non-Communist leader of Poland since the ...

Felt the need to share what has been described as 'the funniest story on [the LDYS forums]'. Not sure if quite hits the height of the chap who canvassed a half-naked woman, who had a naked man standing behind her chained the bannister to which he remarked "Erm, I see you're liberal then". I should really have said that but it took me a while to catch on... A friend and I were canvassing a block of scary flats (they didn't look scary, but the first guy we met told us that none of the other parties dare canvass said ...