LibDem Blogs - Archived!

If you were to design the perfect place for a pub, would it not be in an open air setting bordering on a park? What other park of any size have we locally than Weavers Fields, and what other pub than the Cavalier? Sure, it's not open as a pub at the moment, but surely that's the kind of place valued by the community that we should be striving to create/recreate. Or would you prefer to knock...

I am pretty gutted about what happened to City Walk. Labour members of the Development Committee swung in favour of building on the one remaining bit of open space there. Quite what convinced them, I don't know, but they were not going to go against the officers' recommendation in the face of an applicant who had already put in an appeal for non-determination (i.e. he complained that the...

Further to yesterday's blog about Overview & Scrutiny Committee asking to the Cabinet to reconsider their decision on the sale of Cheviot House, the Cabinet did spend 30 minutes debating the Cheviot House issue, but predictably pushed through the sale of the asset. Interestingly, Cllr Abbas did place some combative questions and belatedly declared a business interest concerning the funding of...

Today was the day of my sudoku heat - it turned out it was the very last regional final in this year’s Independent Sudoku Grand Master Championship. Having killed time after work in the National Library and had a dinner of traditional brain food - at Burger King - I headed off to find the hotel [...]

In case you’re not a widget user, here’s some simple code which can also be used to sign people up to your site… <script language="JavaScript" src="http://petitions.libdems.org.uk/showCode.php" type="text/javascript"></script> should produce the following: Again… any ideas for improvement are most welcome. There’s obviously loads that could be done to make it ultra-sexy but I didn’t want to take over [...]

Earlier this year David Cameron made the shortest (and thinnest) reply ever to a Budget Statement. Last night - at a City event George Osborne, the Shadow Chancellor, spoke for all of six minutes, and guess what, over-regulation is bad, the tax system too complicated, da-da, da-da, and eschewed a Q&A session. You might think this is the sort of thing I always say. But this come from the Times' City Diary. The rest of the article is worth reading too.

If you look on the top-right of the side bar on this blog’s home page, you may be able to see a sign-up box for the Lib Dem Supporters network. It’s more or less the same one that we’re using on Ming’s website. That sign-up box is the world’s first Lib Dem Wordpress Widget! [...]

Tomorrow afternoon, Ming Campbell will be making a keynote speech on his vision for the future of the party. There will also be a webcast, available at the federal site (check there tomorrow to see it!). He will also be launch a new and expanded version of our e-supporters network, which we will be supporting here, as I'm sure many other Lib Dem bloggers will do. Following the speech, we will be taking your questions for Ming here - a page with a form where you can submit your question will appear tomorrow afternoon, after the speech. We'll ...

Ming Campbell had Blair aquirming at PMQs today - and the ranks of Labour MPs were unhappy too. Ming chose reports of UK complicity in US torture flights as the point of attack - and Blair's answer was lame indeed. This is the BBC version: [Ming] hit the prime minister fair and square with a classic liberal issue of the sort his predecessor regularly raised - rendition. His style was no different to previous performances - all ramrod straight and, frankly, sparkle-free....With a brace of un-flashy questions he attempted to get some answers from the prime minister over the ...

Following the trip to Pakistan I made in May to talk with young Pakistani's about relations between the so-called 'West' and the so-called 'Muslim World' I have now attended the Pakistani High Commission in London to give a presentation and de-brief.

The Shed competed in the Uni's end of term summer festival on Monday & Tuesday, progressing as far as the the semi-final before being knocked out 2-1 with a deflected shot being the winner! This is a great effort from the team to make it to the final 4 from 80 teams entered, and the best result they've had in this annual event. Its even better when you consider the average age of The Shed is close to 30, while the student teams are close to 20. The photo below is of Tony Simpson dribbling past a host of defenders ...

Today's Torygraph has a fascinating article by Prof Anthony King putting into context how the last seven Labour and Tory opposition leaders have fared in the polls in their first six months in charge. It might just give some hyper-Tories, convinced David Cameron is about to lead their party to a great election victory, some pause for thought. It shows that Labour's opposition leaders have

My youngest daughter's 17th birthday today. I have to get her up for presents and cards at 7.30am - poor thing. Finished her AS's yesterday thank goodness. So dash off to work. Am studying the news very hard this week as I am on Question Time tomorrow and live in terror of not knowing about some issue that may come up. Lib Dem Home Affairs Team first thing - and we thrash out our views on the

Congratulations to Sue Doughty, Guildford's former Lib Dem MP who has been reselected to fight the seat again in the next general election. Over the next four years, we are fighting a council that has failed the people of Guildford. The Tory Borough Council legacy contained many nasty surprises, such as [b]fraud[/b] when one of their Councillors was disqualified for voter fraud. We then proceded to take that seat off them in the subsequent byelection. They have constantly failed over the Civic. Much more money has been wasted than would have been done if the old ...

Ok the BBC, Rob Renwick and even Iain Dale all agree that Sir Menzies Campbell had a good PMQs today. He asked the Prime Minster about rendition flights using the USA in light of the latest report from the Council of Europe which has claimed the UK has colluded in CIA rendition flights. Tony Blair was clearly flustered and gave an non-commital answer saying that the report added nothing new.

A sunny day in the Polish capital. As always, I marvel at the indomitable will that rebuilt this city from the utter ruin that the Nazis left. However, it is fair to say that the current political climate is less certain. The provincial and insular politicians who currently form the bulk of the ruling PiS have now been joined by the Catholic Jihad faction ot the LPR-League of Polish families- although League of the Adams family might actually be more accurate. Meanwhile the cynical and aggressive Andrzej Lepper's "Self Defence" is in the unusual position of actually looking sophisticated- at ...

My selection campaign for the Mid Scotland and Fife regional list continues and is taking up the vast majority of my spare time, hence the absence of posts. It seems however that the Sheridan Libel case remains deservedly the hotest story on the Scottish Political Block, and with good reason, this could lead to the  sensational and [...]

Tuesday's Evening Mail carried this story about a Guild motion to celebrate the future demise of Maggie Thatcher.Today, the motion has been pulled because of the furore, which even made it onto the BBC.Anyway, I've only just had a chance to bang out a letter, which I guess will not be printed now, so reproduced here for posterity:Richard Angell is clearly a Thatchers child, and demonstrates much that was wrong with the Tories during the 80s. (Thatcher party call, page 2, Evening Mail, Tuesday June 6).Richard has sunk to the level of the government of the time by being as ...

Ming infinitely better at PMQs today.  Big speech tomorrow.  Lots of good staff in place around him now.  A turning point? Let’s hope so.

Absolutely ages since I've been to a gig, so it was really good to pop up to Wolverhampton on Monday evening to catch The Beautiful South live.I haven't worked out who the support act were, the lead singer was a bit of a mumbler. I think they were welsh... One song was about dressing like ot the the seventies, another "arrow to my heart" or similar.TBS essentially mixed their set list between showcasing tracks from their current album and old favourites. Everyone sang along or bobbed up and down in time to their anthemic songs.Good time had by all.

This post over at Resurgent Liberal could not be more true and is well worth a read if either you deal with journalists on a regular basis or are going to be. And this point in particular is well worth remembering: "Understand and work to the paper’s timings. Understand the cycle that the paper works to: when the main stories are decided, when the deadlines are, when the paper gets put to bed.

I've graduated from the University of Surrey with a 2:1 in my BSc (Hons) Computing & Information Technology. Good luck to all those waiting for results. I think it's Beer O'Clock! :)

The Times reports an incident that occurred when Sarah Teather went canvassing in the Bromley & Chislehurst by-election: ST: Hello! I’m calling on behalf of the Liberal Democrats. Who will you be voting for? Man: Who do you think? ST: I don’t know. Man: You’re not very observant are you? ST: (Scanning windows for posters) Aren’t I? Who? Man: Can’t you [...]

There was a moment of confusion in yesterday's Plenary when the Deputy Presiding Officer had to clear up a misappehension that some people might have had that the Assembly may be a circus. As it happened it occurred during my speech on the Post Office and, even though I had a colourful tie on, I did not think that it amounted to a full blown clown's outfit. I was just starting to get into my stride when Mick Bates hung up a poster behind me calling for local Post Offices to be saved: Peter Black: I will start ...

The lead story in today’s theguardian reports that the Government is planning to introduce relatively low limits defining what is considered “possession” of illegal drugs and what is “intent to supply”. I’m not a lawyer so was a little confused when the article said When the ACMD’s technical committee considered the issue in April, it was pointed [...]

Alex Wilcock’s post about how to get covered by Doctor Who magazine reminds me of an enjoyable and long lunch I had with the editor of one of the local weekly papers back in the days that I was a PPC. Amongst other things, I asked him what I could do to get in the paper [...]

Brian Jenner over at Conservative Home has produced 10 ways to liven up your Conservative Association 1) SERVE GOOD FOOD People want to try something new. Keep an eye on your High Street. If an exotic restaurant opens, put your head round the door and introduce yourself. ‘I’m involved with the local Conservative Association, could we do a deal to have a buffet in your fantastic new place? We’ll

It had to happen eventually. The only surprise is that it has happened so soon. Withdrawal from the European People's Party is the one cast-iron commitment that David Cameron has made to his party. Some may point to his changing policy on grammar schools; when running for the leadership, he was in favour, but has since supported the government in restricting academic selection. However, most people expect him to flip back again should he win the next election, allowing most Conservatives to let that issue slide for the time being. Yesterday's Telegraph described the EPP withdrawal policy ...

Well the Scottish Senior Citizens Unity Party MSP John Swinburne has called for the return of corporal punishment in Scotland's schools. The belt was banned from use in Scotland's schools 20 years ago. When the MSP recently raised the matter in the Scottish Parliament Green co-leader Robin Harper accused the MSP of proposing the licensed assault of pupils. Mind you it is to be expected from an

Many readers will have written press releases at some time or another, and seen all the usual advice; identify the where, what, who and when, keep it to one page, put your quotes in separate paragraphs and so on. I’ve written quite a lot myself, when a candidate or helping out others, with a patchy record of success. They were all a few years back, but since then I’ve had rather more success with getting quotes into somewhere else, and it’s experience I’ll use if I ever get back into trying to get my Lib Demmery into the local paper. ...

Queen's Flight Q:To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs on what occasions she has travelled on the Queen's Flight since 2002; what the (a) departure point, (b) destination, (c) distance travelled and (d) cost was of each flight; how many (i) other Ministers and (ii) officials travelled on the same flight; how the costs are calculated; and on what basis decisions are

This article is by Phil Grant The chameleon army over at Conservative Home have some tips on revitalising one's local association: 3) GET PRIVILEGED ACCESS Is there somewhere in your local area which you would really like to visit, but it’s not open to the public? A nuclear power station, a stately home, a corporate headquarters? Give the head honcho a call and ask if you can have a tour. What a wonderful image. Smithers: "Why don't you say a few words to our visitors, sir?" Mr Burns: "I am delighted to welcome you all to ...

I generally tend to believe police announcements; what’s more, I want to. So when they get into the spin game about something really important and make me get that sinking feeling where I can’t believe a word they say, it’s really not a good move. That’s what’s happened, of course, with the ‘terror raid’ in Forest Gate at the weekend. There are few services for which trust is more important than the police; if they contrive to make everyone think they’re a bunch of liars out to cover their own backs, it can’t help them do their job. ...

According to Britains oldest war veteran that is the secret to a long life. For the full story click here

A letter writer in today's Guardian illustrates why it is a good idea not to draw conclusions on the British political scene from Tokyo. Phillip Hall concludes that: During his six-month reign, Cameron has highlighted green policies and attacked big business over bad practice. The message should be clear: the Conservatives are gaining ground by moving to the left, while Blair persists with an outmoded Thatcherite platform the electorate thought it had dumped in 1997. His summation of Cameron's position however is as superficial as the Tories' own green conversion. The fact is that Cameron has ...

Time for another look at the search terms that have brought people here. Fewer political ones than in recent months, and a bit of a historical flavour here and there.25/05, 22:49:02 Google: he said 1...26/05, 14:14:30 Google: davina james-hanman Old student union political acquaintance of mine26/05, 16:26:36 Google: ben ramm ming campbell Fight! Fight! Fight!27/05, 18:18:52 Google: l33t spk w00t29/05, 03:39:37 Google: "Leah Darbyshire" "So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, good night"29/05, 08:37:36 Google: "and then" 2...29/05, 10:10:52 Google: tony pond tr7 70s rally driver with a way cool car29/05, 15:56:11 Google: and he said... 3...30/05, 00:13:44 Google: and then 4...30/05, ...

Where should the new improved and enlarged Foyer be sited? East Homes (formerly East Thames) has apparently given up on extending its existing Foyer on Weavers Fields and has struck a deal with the Council to take over "obsolete" Cheviot House. After 1,400 people objected to its latest application on the grounds of a bulky building on limited open space, East Thames has finally adopted a course...