The 9th Korean Festival on the Fairfield today was a delight, in spite of the chilly breeze. I was expecting to find... ... wonderful silk costumes, exciting new foods (that's the Mayor of Merton tasting kim chee - pickled cabbage - with me), music and dancing. But I wasn't expecting to witness a traditional wedding, which we were reassured was a real one. ...
I discovered today that there has been published a biography of Max Woosnam. His sporting acheivements include: - making a century at Lords for the Public Schools XI - winning Cambridge Blues in 6 sports - captaining England and Manchester City at football - representing Corinthians on their tour to Brazil in 1913 - winning an Olympic Gold Medal for Tennis in 1920 - scoring a 147 break in snooker - winning a gold medal for shooting at Bisley - playing golf off scratch His party piece was to take on all-comers ...
Saturday The answer to this question appears to be "quite a lot" if you are Doctor Who and the afternoon in question is Monday 16 July 1966. Even though the 16 July in 1966 was actually a Saturday. This sort of thing happens a lot with a time machine – Rose Tyler manages to take in the Autons, the End of the World and the Gelth between meals before Dr Who's wonky navigation lands her a year into her own future, but for a REALLY classy example of TIME MANAGEMENT you have to travel back to the 1960s. ...
From the Economists View blog that I like to dip into - Free to Choose: From Singapore Economist:Milton Friedman t.v. series available on-line, by singapore economist: Andrew Chamberlain of the The Idea Shop points out that legendary economist Milton Friedman's television show "Free to Choose" is now available on-line for free...Original 1980 Series (10 Volumes): Volume 1: Power of the
Julian Glover on Comment is Free has a pretty good piece on the Lib Dem tax proposals. He notes the timing problem. This might have been a fairly big story if it had not been for the terrorism story. On the other hand, I am not convinced that anyone will want to read much about politics in the middle of August. So maybe the blow is not all that big. And anyway the proposals are bound to be get the attention they deserve, because no one knows how Conference will vote. The big story is the move away from high ...
Iain Dale’s blog carries some exclusive news of a deal between Transport for London and the Venezuelan Government. I won’t rude and republish any of it here, the direct link to the entry is here.
So - my first year (and a bit) as MP for Hornsey Wood Green has come to an end. My conclusions thus far are that there aren't enough hours in the day, days in the week or weeks in the year - and cloning humans would be helpful! It also has to be one of the best jobs in the world. It is the sheer scope of what has to be dealt with over any week that keeps the interest at boiling point. Being
There is a tendency nowadays to react to views that one disagrees with by calling for them to be censored or banned. This is especially so when a high ranking civil servant is the source of these thoughts. It is almost as if these people are not entitled to personal opinions of their own or the right to express them. Personally, I deplore such a reaction. It is my view that policy can only be developed through open and honest debate and that those who have an expertise in a subject should not be barred from participating in that discussion ...
Just had a couple of easy days of about 10 or so miles each - yesterday from Bridge of Orchy to Crianlarich, then today from Crianlarich down to Ardlui - and tomorrow will be about the same from Ardlui to Rowardennan, though the path along Loch Lomond is quite tricky in parts so it’s not [...]
Every so often a bored friend will send round an email with a list of questions designed to explore unexciting features of your character, such as what your is your favourite flavour of lolly-pop or whether you prefer waffles or pancakes. As an antidote to this banality, we have created the Inner West Test - a series of questions to explore your higher self. At some point we will probably give the test a go ourselves, but for now have fun, and remember that those that sit on the fence get splinters up their arses. The Inner West ...
I've just received a letter today from Bromley Borough Council regarding the conversion of the old school buildings into a residential development. This appears to be playing out exactly as we feared and it seems that the Focus leaflet that Lennard Woods, Mike Deves and myself put out in March was very appropriate. We will make sure that the results of the survey taken at that time are fed to the council and we would like to thank once again all residents who took the trouble to respond. Local residents are encouraged to review the plans on the ...
Curiously, although perhaps unsurprisingly, I'm away again, this time deep in the Indian Ocean on the island of Mauritius. It's a long story, so I won't bore you with the details, although fortunately, our flight left before London's latest terrorist scare (but only just, it would seem). This time, I'm with my family, mother, father, kid brother, his wife, their three lovely children and my
For all my moaning about moving in to London, I am forced to concede that the view could be much worse… Mind you, the trains last night were murder - or rather suicide. Someone chucked themselves under the Gatwick Express at Clapham Junction at 7pm, by midnight it was still that case that nearly every train [...]
LibDemBlogs is full of posts about the Liberal Democrats new tax proposals which include... um... something about making it more environmentally friendly and dropping the top rate of tax... and stuff. What's Ming doing with his hands? It feels almost cruel to tell them that the average person doesn't care about the technicalities of tax, they want to know whether they are going to have more in
Liam Byrne, Labour MP for Birmingham Hodge Hill and Home Office Minister has announced that the UK Government will start to send asylum seekers back to Zimbabwe. Deportations to Zimbabwe have not been allowed since last October's court ruling. 
Perplex City, the £100,000 game to find a valuable cube buried somewhere on the planet, is building up to a climax - and they've set us a particularly tough task as part of it. One strand of the game involves solving puzzlecards, 256 puzzles ranging from the easy and the familiar right through to the all-but impossible.Card #256 is one of the last wave of puzzles to be released, and it seems to be a test of whether it's possible to track down one individual with no details about them other than a photo. It's a real-life test of six ...
I'm finally returned to Blighty, after a mere 19-hour plane, train and autobus trek from Cadiz in Spain. I had a lovely time, and thank you for asking. To prove how seriously I take my blogging responsibilties, I've uploaded a new vidcast for your viewing pleasure. (That it's a little discursive and disjointed I ascribe to the lateness of the hour when it was recorded. And not at all to the
I'm going to be going through these carefully tomorrow but from a quick overview I think that the Tories are going to start getting worried (Iain Dale is trying to fain boredom but I suspect that he's worried that we've outflanked the Tories by planning to remove so many of the poorer members of society from income tax). They are in the bunker it seems worrying about the top 1% as usual. Their faux green credentials are also coming apart with the usual chunterings on about "hitting rural communities" and how the poorest "drive old cars" and all ...
Another area of interest from our Tax Commission are the 5 areas chosen as key principles. Broadly these are "We aim to reform the tax system to make it: Fairer: progressive in relation to income and wealth Simpler: for individuals and companies: fewer rates and reliefs, more transparent Greener: taxing environmental pollution and resource depletion and giving bigger incentives to sustainability More Local: greater freedom for democratic local government to raise (and spend) revenue More Efficient: recognising the importance of incentives to work and save; and growing global competition" I think there's ...
One area of the Liberal Democrat Tax Commission that remains work in progress are our local taxation proposals. The broad principle, to replace Labour's unfair Council Tax with a system based on 'ability to pay' has widespread agreement in the party. The exact mechanism of doing that does not. The old proposal, which is still current, is the introduction of a Local Income Tax (LIT), a proposal, that as the sole mechanism for refinancing, was widely criticised for ensuring we lost ground in Tory-Lib Dem marginal seats at the 2005 election. The benefits of LIT are that's it ... | < | August 2006 | > | ||||
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