LibDem Blogs - Archived!

There was a silly article by Alice Miles in yesterday’s Times, but I got a bit distracted by Labour’s implosions. The title gives the gist of her argument: National parties are a waste of time. Let's hear it for the independents. In fact, that’s about all she has to say, but she strings it out over the requisite thousand words by having a general moan about her local council, and a new

Brain Taylor has just said on Newsnight Scotland that turnout looks to be about 40%, only just down on Scottish Parliament election turnouts. With Elgin boxes in it is looking like Lib Dems and Tories are tight for 2nd somewhere in mid 20% but Labour are most definitely bringing up the rear. Brian said a lot of people were interested in the election if not enthused necessarily.

Turn out: 45.7% (pretty high) My old university chum Andrew Kerr reporting.

Brian Taylors prediction bourne out in Text from count Lib Dems and tories tied for second place around mid 20s.  

Brian Taylor reports speculation of SNP hold, Labour drop to 4th on indication of Elgin boxes, too close to call on 2nd place. Turn out in low 40s.

More stuffing, folding and delivery in Harehills on tuesday and wednesday. Its amazing how spirits fall and rise on the basis of a single opinion poll of set of canvassing figures. However the general mood across the city still seems remarkably positive with Labour on the back foot. We will see in due course. Depressing to find a few BNP voters though thankfully when they get to the polling station they won't find a candidate. However I do really feel politicans need to engage with what is making people vote this way. Its got to that stage in the ...

Well if the Middlesborough result is anything to go on this evening could be an intersting one. To need to score 4 once against Basle is one thing to do it again against Bucharest tonight well that is just keeping us all on tenderhooks. Well done to Steve McLaren's men, a shame that the FA have overlooked him for the national top job though. Now that polls are closed in Moray we are waiting for

In final proof that monkeys really can run companies, Nintendo has renamed its upcoming console* Wii. In case readers are unsure how to pronouce this odd name, try "Wee". It's pisspoor It's as though needed has taken a massive dump on all my childhood memories. Why Nintendo, why? See also: ZDNet.comReutersGuardian * Previously titled Revolution

Digg.com took me to this awsome article on the mad as hell “Shelley the Republican” blog; Do conservative Americans really agree with Microsoft’s Steve Balmer that Linux is a Cancer? Perhaps some do, but I suspect this entire thing is a trollsome jape intended to extract mirth at the expense of the credulous. If you intend [...]

From this week's Economist leader on Labour's 'Black April': Mr Blair and his team have sought to do too much, often too fast, without thinking through the implications of the reforms they advocate. Their apparently uncontrollable urge to meddle in everything, constantly seeking to occupy the visionary high ground, saps morale in public services and makes it almost impossible to manage in the here

In many ways Patricia Hewitt deserves everything that happened to her at the Royal College of Nursing conference yesterday and more. This is a woman who served as director of the National Council for Civil Liberties (the old name for Liberty) and now sits in a cabinet that has brought in detention without trial and is planning to bring in compulsory identity cards. This is the woman who excoriated Jim Callaghan at the 1979 Labour Conference - apparently he lost the election to Mrs Thatcher because the British people were disgusted at his failure to bring in true socialist policies ...

There is an article by Roy Wilkinson in today's Guardian that is just too wonderful to be true: When the centenary of John Betjeman's birth is celebrated this August, it will be a very English affair. Radio 4 will have a Betjeman Day, and Joanna Lumley, Ronnie Corbett and Judi Dench will gather to recite his work at a gala performance in the West End. There will be a Cornish Birthday Party, with donkey rides and cream teas by the sea at Polzeath. Also in Betjeman's beloved Cornwall, at Trebetherick, there will be the John Betjeman Centenary Golf Trophy. ...

Via Paul Davies on MakeMyVoteCount, I came across this article from some oik who claims to be the Torygraph’s Europe Correspondent. His article appears to be the worst argument against PR I’ve ever come across: namely, that because the Belgium Parliament failed to force a minister to resign, all PR systems are indefensible. A couple of [...]

The crime statistics are out, and yet again, journalists have chosen to bypass the BCS in favour of reported crime: “Robberies up 6% but crime stable” claims the BBC. Well actually, personal acquisative crime is up by a statistically insignificant 1%. As has been pointed out since time immemorial, an increase in the reported crime [...]

I have just found the facility provided for delegates here, that enables us to have unlimited internet access without having to pay an extortionate sum of money to the hotel. As a result I have spent the last few hours catching up on news and other blogs. Honestly, you go away for a few days and all hell breaks loose. The Home Secretary allows 1,000 plus foreign prisioners to roam free when they should have been deported, Prescott admits to an affair with his secretary, Patricia Hewitt is shouted down by nurses, Neil Kinnock is banned from driving and ...

I had hoped to update the blog with titbits of information recieved from friends at the count throughout the process. However, it appears that in his wisdom, the returning officer has forbidden counting agents from undertaking box counts during the verification phase. Information about who is getting what will only start to filter out once ballots [...]

So what exactly is going on here? An anonymous e-mail was sent to the Western Mail claiming that Assembly Members, Huw Lewis and Lynne Neagle, who are married with a three year old child, used their allowances to move from the deprived Butetown area of Cardiff to leafy Penarth, so as to put their son into a better school. Every AM who has his or her main home outside of Cardiff and Newport is entitled to draw down a £12,000 a year allowance for accomodation. A large number have used the money to buy or rent property. I have ...

It seems we have rattled our opponents (judging by the vitriolic and somewhat illiterate comments we are attracting lately). We should be flattered! There have now been four by elections in the last eight months (3 district and 1 county). In every single one, the Liberal Democrats have come a strong second. In one case, we only missed causing an upset by forty votes. By contrast, Labour have been a distant third on each occasion. Events this week have further served to prove that the wheels are finally coming off the New Labour project. Next week's election results ...

I feel I should promote the new Lib Dem campaign, but thought I could come up with a better banner:

We the wheels have finally fallen of the Labour Government. Rats in a sack springs to mind. You wait for ages for the spin machine at number 10 to mess up, and then, just like waiting for a bus 3 come along at once. The scale of the damage for Labour will not become clear until the [...]

Ming Campbell today visited Norfolk to deliver a keynote speech on tackling Climate Change at the UEA, before visiting Winterton to look at how climate change is impacting on Norfolk now. Coastal erosion and increasing threats of flooding around the Broads are very serious issues that affect livelihoods now.

The Lion, and his Home Office department, has lost track of over 1,000 convicted criminals that should have been considered for deportation before being released.According to Nick Robinson of the BBC and subsequently his Permanent Secretary, Sir David Normington, he has even lost track of 288 individuals since finding out about the situation and so public safety is being put at risk. Quite simply, if this sort of mistake is not worth of a ministerial resignation, what is? Whilst it is now generally accepted that Ministers should not resign for failings in their department that are not their fault, this ...

I've avoided blogging the developing multi-Minister pile-up that's the Labour government and picked up on an interesting piece about intellectuals in Britain. Comment is Free is the independent State of Sanity in the People's Republic of Grauniad - the temptation to tack towards the shores of sensible argument must become overwhelming if there's going to be an inviting-looking comments box on the

Apparently Tony Blair has complimented Patricia Hewitt on the way she handled the jeering and slow-handclapping she received during her address to the Royal College of Nursing yesterday. From the all the coverage she handled it anything but well.

Over 1,000 foreign prisoners have been released who should have be considered for deportation. Over a third of these releases have taken place since Charles Clarke was alerted to this problem around 9 months ago. The rate of releases has actually increased since Charles Clarke was alerted to the problem.

The saga with prisoners who should have been deported is a good example of how the government's failure to answer questions undermines government. From Hansard: Feb 2005 : Column 961W Mr. Hancock: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department (1) how many applicants for asylum who have been granted temporary leave to remain in the UK who have served, or are serving, custodial sentences

Now we've made it onto the Beeb! http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4943450.stm And while we're at it, Charles Clarke really must go! Sign the petition at the Lib Dem website: http://www.libdems.org.uk/

If the Tories are voted back in next week then it is the most vulnerable that will be left most affected. The Tory council has wilfully neglected the people who need it most in the Borough. When I think of the faces of people like my Dad, my Nephew (pictured above who have needs arising from their

On polling day in Moray a fellow blogger has discovered that Moray is considered an offshore community by delivery company Parcel2Go. Apparently deliveries here have to be made under the erroneously entitled Northern Ireland and offshore islands tariff, which is £4 more expensive that guaranteed next day delivery to the so-called mainland. So I'm wondering as a result of IV30 and possibly other

Labour hits the skids Timing immaculate. Already doing badly in the polls, slated on the doorstep by their own supporters - Charles Clarke, Patricia Hewitt and John Prescott decide to put the nail in the coffin of the local elections. How far they will fall - no idea. But to the specifics. After PMQs, Charles Clarke comes to the Despatch Box to make a Statement on the Deportation of Foreign

Liberal Democrats are calling on Charles Clarke to resign as Home Secretary. 1023 foreign prisoners have been released without being considered for deportation. And the Home Office has been aware of this for years. You can sign the petition on the national Liberal Democrat website. The BBC gives the background.

Here is a helpful web application for Labour ministers. Simply print out this post and cross out the choices as applicable. Then hand in at 10 Downing Street. The Deputy Prime Minister/The Secretary of State ODPM/DEFRA/The Home Office/Department of Health 27 April 2006 Dear Tony, Over the last few days I have reflected on the recent situation. While I welcome [...]

I was abroad for Labour's day of crisis but heard Radio 4 at various points during the day (I was only in Brussels). On the radio the most dramatic moments was Hewitt's voice quavering as for a second time she tried to say "nur-ses". But the big news is certainly the prisoner release. It is difficult to imagine a story better calculated to rubbish Labour's claim to be a lynch mob elected to high office (or a government converted into a vigilante group, whichever it is). I´m still waiting for someone to point out in monosyllables that ...

I was abroad for Labour's day of crisis but heard Radio 4 at various points during the day (I was only in Brussels). On the radio the most dramatic moments was Hewitt's voice quavering as for a second time she tried to say "nur-ses". But the big news is certainly the prisoner release. It is difficult to imagine a story better calculated to rubbish Labour's claim to be a lynch mob elected to high office (or a government converted into a vigilante group, whichever it is). I´m still waiting for someone to point out in monosyllables that ...

The Liberal Democrats have set up a petition calling on the Home Secretary Charles Clarke to go following the revelation that 1023 have been released into the community without being considered for deportation. 288 of these arose after the Home Office became aware of this situation. Nick Clegg the Lib Dem shadow Home Secretary said: "We now know that the Home Office has been aware of this

The Maltese really excelled last night. After a long day debating the future of the European Community in the presence of the European Commission Representative to Malta, they bussed us into Valletta for a dinner in our honour. The coach stopped a few hundred yards short of the venue so we got out to walk through residential streets behind a brass band. On arriving at we were met by a bugler and drummer in traditional dress. There is no doubt that, having been recently admitted as a full member of the EEC, Malta are determined to make their mark ...

What a day yesterday was. The Lib Dems on 24 % or as much as 28% in the areas that will matter next week according to Bob Worcester. Then the Labour Party starts to self destruct in front of our eyes. The "two shags" story will probably disappear as fast as it appeared unless there are further revelations. Prescott is in any case (in my opinion) a bit of an exception. Partly because nobody takes him that seriously, partly because everybody assumes he will go when Blair goes and partly because a lot ...

When do governments reach a tipping point? That moment when it all simultaneously implodes, slumps, disintegrates, splinters and collapses. Today's news could scarcely be any worse for Tony Blair: Charles Clarke is in serious trouble because of the foreign prisoners’ deportation debacle;Patricia Hewitt opens herself up to ridicule for claiming the NHS is experiencing its "best ever year", which