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Being a school governor is an educative experience: I offer two illustrations. A couple of years ago, the state primary school where I am a governor was 'Ofsted-ed'. I have long felt there is great value in being subject to outside scrutiny. If nothing else, it forces you to look at yourself as others see you. In fact, I found the inspection to be a surprisingly negative experience. The four-day

A Logical Voice points you to an important story on the Common Dreams site: Better protection for the diversity of the planet's creatures and plants could help shield humans from diseases like AIDS, Ebola or bird flu and save billions of dollars in health care costs, researchers said on Tuesday. They said human disruptions to biodiversity -- from roads through the Amazon jungle to deforestation in remote parts of Africa -- had made people more exposed to new diseases that originate in wildlife. "Biodiversity not only stores the promise of new medical treatments and cures, it buffers humans from ...

Not sure I should share the results of the latest test at: http://similarminds.com/othertests.html What Classic Movie Are You?personality tests by similarminds.com

Ed Davey, the Lib Dem shadow education secretary, has issued a press release on Ruth Kelly's education statement today. It begins: The Government should focus on standards not structures. It is what happens in the classroom, not the boardroom that makes the difference in a child's education. The Government's proposals today won't change anything, in any classroom, anywhere in the country. Handing over admissions risks a free-for-all between schools, producing a shambles that will confuse parents, not help them. If "standards not structures" sounds familiar, Estelle Morris will explain why. Last month, in her first outing as a columnist ...

Two of the more intelligent right-wing journalists - Max Hastings and Simon Jenkins - have recently started writing for the Guardian. I suspect this represents a happy coincidence of interest. Alan Rusbridger, the Guardian's editor, is on record as saying: "If I had to choose between occupying a niche on the left or being nearer the centre, whether you display that through your news reporting or your comment or both, I'm more comfortable saying this an upmarket, serious mainstream newspaper. There's more potential for growth there than taking comfort in political positioning."Equally, I am sure that Hastings and Jenkins relish ...

Jezblog points us towards an amusing story on the BBC site: Flowers and tributes were left in an alleyway where the body of a mystery dead baby was found - before police realised it was only a chicken foetus ... Well-wishers had laid more than a dozen bunches of flowers at the scene, along with cards and teddy bears. One of the cards read: "RIP Little Baby. Safe in the arms of Jesus. From someone who is a loving mother xxxx." Merseyside Police told the community on Monday to "stop grieving, it's only a chicken".

Jonathan Calder and Peter at the Apollo project came out as Apocalype now. I'm What Classic Movie Are You?personality tests by similarminds.com As reported earlier Andrew Murray was off to a flying start we TYim Henman rallied and made a mathc of it. But hte boy from Dunblane won in the end on a tie break in the 6th set. Two good things about this match Murray did not lose his way or nerve too

The mess that the Government has got itself into over a smoking ban in England is entirely of its own making. Whilst Ministers argued amongst themselves they forgot the golden rule of any reform, if it is not based on clear and unequivocable principle then it becomes shabby and indefensible. It is tempting to say that the muddle we are now being presented with has been cobbled together in smoke-filled rooms by Ministers who thought that they were acting in the best interests of the public but who, in their desire to avoid being accused of implementing a nanny state, ...

As a general rule, I don't like Simon Jenkins' articles. In this case, the substance of the article is pretty good however. The problem is with this intemperate comment: These days Blair could invade the Sudetenland and Poland without Labour objecting. Blair = Hitler? Labour = Hitler apologists? Or maybe Jenkins has the Labour Party down as appeasers. Given his own antipathy to the war in Iraq,

....but this was inevitable.

by PeterJonathan Calder came out as Apocalype Now. So did I. Does the same thing happen to all Lib Dem Bloggers?The Famous Leader Test came out like this: What Famous Leader Are You?personality tests by similarminds.comI´ll give the theatre a miss tonight...

For those who didn’t know, the song is The Warrior by Scandal. For those who haven’t seen it, you are just a bad person. A bad person. I will resist the temptation to suggest that the Griffins are a solidly Democrat family, but they are ;-) Update: if you are totally lame and don't know what I'm on about: http://familyguyipodcommercial.ytmnd.com/

by Peter Schadenfreude may be the German language's greatest gift to the the world, and stories of Labour splits often bring about this agreeable sensation. But the spat over smoking in pubs does not qualify. People join political parties to deal with bigger issues. There is no more reason to believe that all members of the Labour Party should agree to a common position on smoking than to think that all Liberal Democrats should agree on foxhunting. According to the BBC: The Tories say the government is in disarray, calling it a "shambles". This ...

Latest from Basel youngster Andy Murray has taken the first set off British No. 1 Tim Henman 6-2.

The attached story is about how the Call Centre Industry is getting ready to get rid of silent calls. What we need now is for Ofcom to play their part. I received an email today from Ofcom which said: We're happy that we're making good progress. We'll be in touch when we have anything more useful to report. This is not as good as it could be, but is better than nothing.

With Blair propably off preparing for the EU mini summit tomorrow Geoff Hoon was at the dispatch box for Prime Minster's Questions today. Unlike last weeks debacle he seemed to run on time. But if the best he could come back to David Heath about Labour's over draconian anti-terror laws was that the Liberal Democrats should start living in the real world it may be some time before he allowed back.

Since my friend Daniel first mentioned string theory to me a year or so ago, I have been keen to comprehend it better; but as a non-scientist I have inevitably struggled like crippled wasp. The ever-growing body of work on the theory is quite brilliant though, working towards what is essentially a final theory of everything. The idea is that the lowest forms of matter in the universe are in fact ‘strings’, a loop of fundamental particle existing in seven parallel dimensions. Obviously four of these dimensions exist in the sphere of our consciousness, the remaining ones don’t, which makes ...

With both Tony Blair and John Prescott away, it would appear that Geoff Hoon is running the country. PANIC!!! Seriously, they can’t BOTH be away can they? When was the last time that neither of them turned up to PMQs? Surely the point of having a deputy is that when the boss is away, [...]

In July 2005 alone, Israel seized more land in the West Bank than it surrendered in Gaza: it withdrew from about 19 square miles of territory while sealing off 23 square miles of the West Bank. Israel's continuing land grab is a disgrace. As is the silence from Washington and the European capitals, intimidated as they are by 'the lobby'. Israel's policy shares much with Apartheid-era South

After a two-week absence from the blogosphere to attend to professional matters, I return to spend an entertaining evening deleting a large quantity of spam from this blog. If you blog with Blogger.com, you'll be aware that there has been a rash of automated spam content over the past month (for more details, see Blogger Buzz and Bayosphere). The motive behind this spamming is to pollute the

On Saturday I staffed at the Nottingham Beer festival with the Young Camra lot, and I actually discovered that it's a lot of fun. You get a free half pint glass, a free t-shirt and 2.5 pints of free beer. However as you have people asking "which is the best", or "can I have a really hoppy one" of course you need to trial a small sample of all the beers :) I ended up spending 5 hours behing the

A station announcement from yesterday evening: Regular customers may notice that trains are running on time this evening. Apologies for any confusion this may cause. Shortly followed by: Spoke to soon. I’ll kill that signalman. Tags: station+announcements, travel, rail © Will on No geek is an island, 2005. [...]

Whatever doubts I may have about Labour’s new proposals on education, I will agree with Jonathan Calder on one thing: it is entirely consistent for the Tories to agree with them. Cameron is quite right to point out that after eight years we appear to be right back to Grant Maintained Status. Cameron’s tactic is [...]

I’m massively behind schedule on my attempt to blog the Lib Dems’ Tax Commission (pdf), so without further ado… This chapter is basically wrapped around a single proposal. That is, to radically shift the tax burden of local authorities from 20% local taxes / 80% national government to 80%/20%. In principle, I absolutely applaud this initiative. [...]