LibDem Blogs - Archived! - Saturday 17th February 2007

Ming Campbell in a hung parliament

There is an interesting aside in an article on the Scottish elections in this morning's Guardian: Some observers believe Sir Menzies has privately agreed with Labour ministers, particularly Gordon Brown, whose constituency in Fife borders his own, to maintain a centre-left coalition between the two parties in the Scottish parliament.No doubt the Scottish Lib Dems can look after themselves, but it is interesting to speculate what might happen in the event of a hung parliament at Westminster after the next election. Despite his patrician mien - and despite Lady Elspeth - most of Ming's close political friendships are with ...

Judge John Deed: An apology

I'll never say the plot lines of that series are far fetched again. Tomorrow's Mail on Sunday reports: The Government was hit by a second legal marital scandal last night after it was revealed that Attorney General Lord Goldsmith had an affair with Britain’s leading Asian woman barrister.

Best of Paxman

Found care of Stephen Tall I am a great fan of Paxman, as long as I never have to be interviewed by him.

Still ill... It's just not funny now

I'm still suffering. It's got better, yes, but I am still coughing lots and sleeping little. I was supposed to be in Newcastle this weekend, but since we are both stricken by Plague, we've decided to stay here. I spent yesterday trying to get further information on Tulle Court for a local resident. We are still getting to the bottom of who owns it, and whether or not the Council got the best

Laying some ghosts to rest (Northampton 15 - Harlequins 28)

I was at Franklin Gardens two years ago when Quins lost to a last second try, starting the slide that would lead us to relegation. For most of the second half of this match I got that familiar feeling that we were going to throw it all away again. Trailing by 6 points with 5 minutes to go Northampton threw the kitchen sink at Quins stringing together a sequence of around 15 phases that went

older and slightly tender

After a hard week at work I was able to celebrate turning 34 yesterday. Although older and wiser, we went to Snobs last night. Its been ages since we've been, but its still a class indie club. Once we got onto the dance floor we barely stopped. So today I'm just a little stiff and sore, and my hearing is absolutely ringing. A bit of light leafleting this afternoon helped to ease the stiffness.

Day 2238: Innocent Druggie's Life Ruined By Publicity

Friday: A man who was only wanted for POSSESSION OF CANNABIS had his mugshot published by police when he failed to attend a magistrate's court is now complaining that it made him look like a CRIMINAL. Therefore we beg of you: stop using this photo! You are ruining this man's life! (and the rest of us have had enough of him, too!) {Posted by Picasa}

Here today gone tomorrow, Half Term

Finally blew away the dregs of sore throat and cold in Plymouth this week - it's so mild there, the daffs are out already! I headed home to the joy of ever more leaflets and a rare treat .... coffee and chockie biscuits at South Clough Allotments to have a look at where their new fence will go. I'd chatted with the allotment committee months ago as we went through the process of grant

Snapping the woods

I've been asked by a member of the Friends of Millwood and Alderwood to act as a referee for a fundraising application, which I signed this week just gone. Happy to do it as this is one of Liverpool's lesser known little gems which more people really ought to know about. The woods, on the east of Speke, can be a little haven of peace. Sometimes, if I have a spare bit of time and I am in that area, I just take a walk in. there is a point where you get the sound of ...

New Trousers Sir?

File this one under "close call".

Seeing it from another perspective

Curiously, although I've worked with a great many Parliamentary and European Parliamentary selection committees over the years, I've never actually sat on one, and so I found myself in central London this morning, attending a training session for prospective selection committee members. In target seats, we insist that all members of the selection committee are trained, but relax that requirement

Zoo Library News Update

“We don’t have any books on feng shui for monkeys” Los Angeles Zoo feng shui consultant Simona Mainini, quoted in today’s Guardian

No platform for those who limit free speech

The University of Manchester Students' Union is not alone in having a "no platform" policy which allows the union to stop people advocating discrimination or racial hatred. The relevant part of the union's constitution is article 1.3.f, which reads: To oppose discrimination against persons on any grounds including age, disability, political opinion, race, religion, sex or sexuality. This clause shall not compel the Union to provide a platform for advocating such discrimination and those the Union believes will incite racial hatred.It is obvious that this clause limits the ability of people to say what they like on union property. I ...

We will introduce more free-to use ATMs

Trust in Wales Ymddiried yng Nghymru Welsh Liberal Democrat Deputy Social Justice spokesperson Jackie Radford, candidate for South Wales West, said: “Being denied free access to your own money is one of the most unfair elements of modern society, and is a serious problem for the least well-off in Wales. “Working with the Citizen’s Advice Bureau, the WLGA and banks, we would develop planning guidance to make it easier for local authorities to encourage free-to-use ATMs in their communities. We would also use this planning guidance to make it more difficult to ...

We would reject Tony Blair’s school selection reforms

Welsh Liberal Democrat Deputy education spokesperson Tudor Jones, candidate for North Wales, said: “The Welsh Liberal Democrats want to see schools working together to improve chances for all children, not competing against each other over selection of pupils as Tony Blair wants in England. “We reject New Labour’s reforms in education that promote selection in the school system and any plans to introduce similar measures in Wales. We propose a different approach which encourages greater school co-operation. “To create the best learning environment we want to see all in the education sector building new relationships that maximises students’ ...

Police cash row is result of Labour short changing Wales

Welsh Liberal Democrat Assembly leader Mike German has waded in to the row over police funding, revealing that Wales' police forces are losing out more than £50m of police funding every year - enough to pay for more than 1,000 extra police officers - due to Labour underfunding. Under Home Office spending plans Wales receives 5.2% of police funding for England and Wales. Under the Barnett Formula, Wales receives 5.89% of spending in English departments - the difference adds up to an extra £50m next year. Mike German, Assembly leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats, said: "Wales is ...

My pigeon

I think I’ll catch a pigeon To teach it how to dance I’ll keep it in the wardrobe And feed it bread from France My pigeon will be stubborn And steadfastly refuse To switch off Silent Witness So I can watch the news My pigeon will make gravy With string and twigs and dirt. Our guests will smile indulgently But leave before dessert.

Would You Credit It?

A study carried out by a credit reference company has revealed Torbay as being the worst in the country for people going bust. This follows a CAB study last November showing the area has the hig...

Overwhelmingly confused?

The fundamentalist Christian “creationist” website “OverwhelmingEvidence.com” is a little bit crazier than usual these days: When it first set-up by conservative theologian and part-time mathematiian William Dembski, it was intended to be a debating forum where teen creationists (i.e. more ignorant than the standard Internet creationists) could jaw about the latest exciting theories from the [...]

Shame of Manchester United's Sponsors AIG

AIG, the American Insurance company that sponsors Manchester United are accused in today's Independent of refusing to pay out on a policy that they have which was supposed to voer deaths and injuries to British servicemen serving in Iraq. AIG claim that the soldier in question is not covered because he took his own life. They seem unable to recognise that he had an extremely high stress job that was made intolerable by his work in Iraq, leading to his suicide. Perhaps the biggest lesson for the MOD would be to take out future policies with British Insurers. ...

Stephen promises free nursery places for all two-year-olds

The Scottish Liberal Democrat conference is underway (you can watch a conference video below - the narrator’s voice may sound familiar), and Nicol Stephen is going to unveil a key plank of the Scottish Lib Dems election manifesto - free nursery places for two-year-olds. He will also reaffirm his commitment to a 100% renewable energy [...]

Africa Liberal Network

The Africa Liberal Network has a shiny new website - much smarter than the freebie I knocked up for them a couple of years ago, though they’ve kept the logo I did and some of the style and colours, which is nice. The company that did it look like they’ve got quite a nice portfolio, so [...]

Happy Birthday

Belated birthday greetings to Mrs Adelaine Hain, who was eighty years young yesterday. Mrs Hain, whose son is of course the MP for Neath, Secretary of State for Wales and Northern Ireland, Labour deputy Leadership contender and one of my constituents, celebrated the big day as guest of honour at a reception in South Africa House. This was of course the same place where, in the 1970s, she used to lead protests against the apartheid regime in her beloved homeland. Her courage and that of her family in standing up to the South African Government on matters of ...

Democrats start to flex their muscles over Iraq

After taking control of the Senate in the US, the Democrats seemed a little unsure at first what to do over Iraq. Be too awkward towards President Bush's plans and they could be seen as not supporting the troops, do nothing and be seen as supporting President Bush. It has been a waiting game to see what they will do, but it now appears they are making their move. The Senate is to vote on Iraq next week, and although the Senate's votes are non binding on the President, it will put clear blue water between Bush and the ...

First amongst equals

The Guardian speculates on a possible looming challenge by David Miliband for the Labour Party leadership, arguing that many MPs are uneasy at the prospect of a Gordon Brown accession. Although Martin Kettle has largely based his piece on rumour, speculation and gossip he nevertheless paints a fascinating scenario. I was quite taken by this section: If it is true, as several MPs have already estimated to me this year, that no more than 70 of Labour's 352 MPs are enthusiastic - as opposed to fatalistic - about Brown as the next leader, is that in itself not also ...

Strictly Pamphleteering

At last, a modicum of sense from the pubescent noodleheads who run the television schedules. I wonder if their ranks have been infiltrated by a Dobsonist? Apparently, there is a forthcoming series called Strictly Pamphleteering, in which contestants will write pamphlets and declaim them on live television. Week by week, the panel of judges and [...]

Watercress prevents cancer

This story from Fridays Guardian is good news indeed particularly for someone who absolutely loves Watercress. I always knew that Watercress was a good source of iron but the article reveals a lot more. Apparently Watercress "contains more iron than spinach, more vitamin C than oranges and more calcium than milk" More importantly the study "suggested that eating 85g of watercress a day could inhibit the growth of cancer cells and even kill them. Scientists at Ulster University found that the watercress reduced the damage caused by cancer cells to white blood cells by 22.9%. Watercress also raised levels ...

Reflections on Greek democracy

As I grew up, I heard a lot on the news about the "Greek colonels". This was a junta which tookover Greece in 1967 and, as Wikipedia describes: In the ensuing years, a number of sympathisers of the left, as well as a number of politicians and communists, were arrested and brutally tortured by the regime. Many politicians evaded capture and found political refuge in other European countries such

Minority report

Saturday 17th February 2007 - This week I featured in a Guardian article about the diversity - or the lack there of - of Members of the European Parliament. Amongst the 785 MEPS that I work with in Brussels, there are only nine of us who aren't white!! That's a staggering 1.1% from the 27 Member States that are represented in the World's only directly elected international chamber. Britain

How to do video campaigning

Internet videos seem to be all the rage for politicians at the moment. Webcamron has been suitably mocked over here, and you can't move over the other side of the pond for aspiring presidents announcing their intentions to be the next leader of the free world on youtube. Of course the problem is that most of them are crap. Shoddily made and/or with pieces to camera that say bunny in the

War - What is it good for?

A version of the classic anti-war song 'WAR' is about to be released by Tony Blair's "re-formed" university band Ugly Rumours.

Young Cabinets Today…

‘Where have all the big beasts gone?’ asked Stephen Tall the other day, bemoaning the lack of substantial figures in the Labour Party beyond Gordon and Tony and summoning in aid the impressive politicians around the Cabinet tables of Harold Wilson or Margaret Thatcher. On the face of it this sounds persuasive: I have to agree that Mr Blair’s Cabinet are nonentities, and neither are there swathes of impressive Labour figures outside it. I wonder, though, if this isn’t one of those questions like ‘aren’t young people today a terrible let-down?’ that have been getting the same answer since Plato. ...

What the UNICEF report dragged in

The UNICEF report has generated a plefora of both sane and insane 'childhood in UK'-related articles. This is one of the insane ones... There are some parts I agree with. I agree that: Labour [has] pursued policies that encouraged more parents of young children to enter the workplaceFurther, I agree with the implicit suggestion made in the article that the government has encouraged children to

Tremendous Potato Urgency

One morning Tiny Enid awoke from uneasy dreams with a sense of tremendous urgency related to potatoes. She was based in Winnipeg at the time, and had taken a room in a motel of undoubted seediness. “I could not pinpoint the reasons for my sense of breathless urgency on that grim March morning,” she wrote, [...]

Day 2237: "Something has gone clearly and radically wrong"

Thursday: Not, it has to be said, entirely the BEST words to hear when you are discussing ATOMIC REACTORS! The people from GREENSLEEVES have been to Court in order to call Lord Blairimort to account. Obviously, Lord Blairimort was found GUILTY. This goes back to last year when Lord Blairimort announced a FULL CONSULTATION into whether we should build new nuclear powered terrorist targets all over the country or whether there might be something a bit cleaner, greener, safer and cheaper that we could do instead. "Right… we're going to have these power stations. ...

Doing It For the Kids

That's me below at Fitzjohn's Primary School leading a discussion on climate change with a group of 5-9 year olds. It's amazing what they knew. I felt quite humbled. Ten Things We Could All Do Today In The Battle Against Climate Change 1) Try to buy local, seasonal, organic fresh food. Better still, sign up for an organic box scheme. 2) Refuse plastic bags plastic bottles. Use your local

Saturday 17th February 2007

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