Last Friday, Norman Baker and other MPs talked out a bill that would have exempted MPs from the freedom of information legislation. But now the bill threatens to make a return because there aren’t enough other things to debate instead, apparently.
I had planned a little light tourism this morning, with the hope of taking a few pictures for the blog. After a leisurely breakfast, I returned to the room, repacked my bags and sallied forth for a few hours in the city by the bay. First, a ride on the trolley. Line F is San Francisco’s historic trolley car line, with an excellent collection of PCC’s to choose from, painted in the colours of
There is not in politicks a more established rule, than, That when a corrupt and wicked ministry intend to pillage a nation, they make use of vile and contemptible instruments, to gather in their plunder, and allow the miscreants part of it; and when the cry for justice becomes strong and universal, they always hang [...]
Just listening to Five Live as I cleaned my teeth and yet again Anita Anand has another Tory PPC on her show. Is she sponsored by the Tory Party or looking for a seat herself ? Talk about political bias, it is ludicrous just how many nights a week she has a Tory PPC on her show.
…rejoice, just rejoice 
Respect is due to Hot Ginger And Dynamite’s post rant about St George’s Day. For the record, I’d love it to be a bank holiday as we don’t have nearly enough of them compared to the continentals. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to start waving a bloody flag all of a sudden, just as [...]
It is the 25th birthday of the Sinclair ZX Spectrum, the "daddy" of British home computers and arguably the reason why British programmers are still world leaders. We first got our "speccy" 24 years ago, but fondly remember sitting in front of the screen for several hours, typing in programs from the magazine "Sinclair Programs". Getting a new game was always a buzz, but when a new game came out from certain manufacturers, particularly the iconic "Ultimate - Play the Game", who are latterly known as Rare and design software still for Nintendo and Xbox. Another ...
It has been really busy over the last few days, I have been out and about all over the place including canvassing in Porthtowan which was particularly lovely as it is where William and I did our vows on the beach. Fantastic, it was a beautiful afternoon and a really banterful canvass! I was at Julia Goldsworthy's dinner on Friday evening, Nick Clegg was the guest speaker and made an excellent speech which somehow managed to cover breastfeeding, the prison system and throwing cutlery at the radio! Everyone was in full black tie and ballgowns and it was down ...
Last Friday a group of MPs, including Norman Baker, Simon Hughes and David Winnick, did great work in talking out David Maclean's bill to exempt MPs from freedom of information legislation. It was sent to the back of the queue of private members' bills. Except there is no queue. The BBC reports: A bill which would exempt MPs from the Freedom of Information Act is to be debated again - a week after its critics thought they had killed it off.Opponents "talked out" the private member's bill introduced by former Tory chief whip David Maclean last week. ...
... the BBC had broadcasted a special programme all about England on St Andrews day ! Well that is what BBC Five Live's Drive programme was doing today, but in reverse. On St Georges Day, Five Live were doing a special programme broadcast from Scotland all Scotland. You couldn't make it up ! P.S. And in this special, how many dim Scot's did they broadcast saying "if we get independence England won't get out oil money". Firstly, an international boundary at sea is likely to put part of the North Sea oil fields in to English waters ...
Sunday: Dalek Sec is NOT the only one to have been EXPERIMENTING! Let us see if THIS works: This 1966 story has evolved, too!
On the occasion of Shakespeare’s birthday, the Society of Authors (the writers’ union, with literary added value) held a party in the Great Hall of King’s College London this evening — nice wine, execrable ’savoury snacks’. Many writers spend their days huddled over word processors in tiny rooms, so it is good to give them [...]
This morning, after the BBC had revealed to the world the scams that GMTV had been running, GMTV read out live on air a very forthright statement claiming that their premium phone lines had been independently verified, they had been scrutinised and they had rigorous procedures that had been adhered to at all times. This evening, a very different statement came out, which has been covered HERE. Two questions come to mind to ask GMTV. 1) Why did it take you ten days since being contacted by the BBC about this before you suspended your phone lines (remember, they were ...
Sometimes I wish the journalists who work for the Islington Tribune actually engaged critical faculties before publishing a story. This week, they have effectively republished a Labour press release calling for the District Auditor to look into the Lib Dem run council’s sale of 220 properties, mostly shops, which is being hotly contested. [...]
Dave Hill asks why the English don't make more of an effort to celebrate St George's Day. I suspect we are far too polite. If you do want to celebrate the day, it seems Salisbury is the place to go. Hot Ginger and Dynamite takes a more jaundiced view: tonight I’ll probably go to the pub, scowl at moaners and then honour St George in the way he would have wanted, by killing an iguana with a foundue (sic.) fork. 
Saturday: So, episode one finished with the time-travelling ALIEN WARLORD turning to camera to reveal that, above his sharply-suited human body, his head was a hideous monstrosity of writhing tentacles around a single alien eye… Still, enough of CITY OF DEATH. {Posted by Picasa} What did Daddy Richard think about THIS {Posted by Picasa} I have to ask: why go to America? Not the series, that's obvious and completely brilliant. I mean, if you're a Dalek stuck in the 1930s… it's not like ...
Rochford District Council is overwhelmingly Tory - they have 34 seats out of 39, we have just 4. One of the elder statesmen of the Tory group is Peter Webster, and what he says in tonights local paper, the Echo, has shocked me by its frankness: Tory raps 'lazy councillors' A FORMER council leader has claimed his own colleagues are more concerned with their allowances than working for their
Unsurprisingly Nicolas Sarkozy and Ségolène Royal were the top two in the first round of the French Presidential elections. François Bayrou, was third with a respectable 18.6%.
Viewers of 18 Doughty Street - the internet TV station synonymous with Iain Dale and the Tories - can get an eyeful of two - yes, two - Liberal Democrat bloggers from 9 o’clock this evening: Andy Mayer from Andy Mayer and Will Howells from No Geek is an Island (and formerly of this site). [...]
The Kremlin has announced that former Russian president Boris Yeltsin has died aged 76. I was a big Yeltsin fan, his involvement in the demise of the Soviet Union, and belief in democracy was legendary especially during the attempt coup against Gorbachev in August 1991.
With news today that Iraqi militants are explicitly threatening to kidnap and murder Prince Harry and reports that militants have also been able to penetrate the armour of Challenger 2 tanks, will Mr Blair's legacy be that he is the first Prime Minister ever to send a monarch's son to his death ? SKY News were recalling earlier that in World War One, when the then Prince of Wales was fighting on the Western Front, his ADC, who was at his side at all times, was ordered that "in no circumstances should he be captured or fall in to enemy ...
For those who "missed" the front page (yes, the front page) of The Sun today, they exclusively revealed that Her Majesty the Queen is a fan of Tottenham's south-London originating rivals from the Emirates stadium. As someone who favours abolition of the monarchy, I took this as good reaffirmation of my support for that - as well as for my support of Spurs!
One of my few treasured memories from my involvement in student politics was the look on the face of a particularly obnoxious member of SWSS losing an uncontested election to RON (re-open nominations). May something similar be about to happen to the front-runners in the race to the Republican presidential nomination? There have been rumblings for many weeks that many in the Republican base are
It seems that Flames of Lincoln have decided to go to the press over the decision by the Development Control Committee to part reject their retrospective planning application for external signs. Now whilst I don’t have a problem with the actual signs, I do believe that they have too many, especially the vee-board over the window. [...]
Many of my non-political friends tell me that they are turned off politics by how petty it is. Well I'm sure this article from Salon will change their minds (hat tip: Political Wire) . It highlights the good spirited policy led debate that is going on amongst those contesting the Republican Primary in my former stomping ground of South Carolina. Or not. This is after all the state that in 2000
I've been a bit slow getting around to posting this, but liked the helpful conclusions Alex drew in the comments of this post Love and Liberty: A Blissful Saturday Evening, following up my own post showing the results of that celebrity-face-scan-thing. Meanwhile, Matt may not look particularly like Tobey Maguire... Zach Braff, Ronan Keating or Seamus Heaney, but the pattern recognition software he tried thinks they all look alike from the clear photo he supplied – without even his wearing a hat, or dark glasses, or being in indistinct shadow, or blurred, or photographed at an odd angle. Not ...
You might know that changes are planned to the timetable of the W3 bus, which goes from Finsbury Park past Alexandra Palace through Wood Green to Northumberland Park. Transport for London would like to make it a 24 hour service, with buses running in both directions, every half hour, throughout the night. Obviously this will benefit many people, as it will help night-shift workers to get home
Apart from changes in political leadership, there's a lot going on in the economy right now which politicians and pundits should be carefully considering. Whatever happens, the MPC, which has hitherto been almost invisible in public life, is going to make much of the political weather for the next election.
A judicial review into the dropping of the Al Yamamah corruption investigation has moved a step nearer.
Spyblog spots a classic piece of old-fashioned, plain vanilla incompetence. Well, either that or the House of Lords Appointment Commission is really a front organisation for the security services…
And then they were mostly found again; thanks to the person who pointed out the reason for the bulk of the difference in the comments. I think the few who are still missing are best not fussed over A little while back the Conservatives boasted about the number of candidates they were standing in [...]
The link is to a story from Cornwall. I know more about this story than is in the paper. Hopefully the Court of Appeal will see sense. The grandparents of two young children are fighting to stop them being put up for adoption by social workers after a court order was granted to take them away from their mother. The couple, who live in Falmouth but cannot be named for legal reasons, looked
We've moved in and there are only seven boxes left to unpack! The decoration isn't entirely finished - little bits here and there to do (for instance, the living room). However it's a really nice flat and we both love it. More blogging soon, I promise - however the past month or so has been full of packing, moving, and unpacking again. Luckily we got Aussie Man and Van to do the actual move - we wouldn't have been able to cope with the three flights of stairs otherwise. (If you're moving we can heartily recommend them). ...
Labour fights dirty (so what's new?) - the smoking gun this time is a leaflet in Abbey Road Ward by-election. I've seen the evidence! It falsely claims that London Assembly Lib Dems want to abolish the Freedom Pass. Does this mean that Labour fears meltdown in Abbey Road on 3rd May? Mm, what a delicious thought. Labour can't win in Abbey Road and doesn't deserve to, especially when it stoops to "dodgy dossier" tactics like these. It is so obvious that in the long run Labour will never get control of the City ...
The rain has returned to Prestwich today, but I’m hoping it won’t prevent us from going out canvassing and meeting more local people on doorsteps and out on the street. One advantage of canvassing over leafleting is that people, by and large, don’t melt into goo when it rains. I have been interested to see some of the Labour leaflets being distributed in the last couple of days. I was hoping for
A pretty decisive result in the first round of the French elections. A whopping 84.5% turnout voted to put Ségo & Sarko - the candidates of the left and right respectively - through to the second round. The centrist candidate, Francois Bayrou, managed only 18%. While British parties are falling over themselves in the fight to occupy the centreground, has France opted for a more polarising election?The Times certainly think so (Run-off for President turns into classic Right-Left duel), describing Mr Bayrou's result as:"a blow for his attempt to forge a "third-way" revolution in French politics"However, this doesn't tell the ...
The wires are hot with speculation. A PPC in a target seat has resigned, apparently. The only thing is nobody knows who it is and which top seat is now vacant.
From 9p.m. onwards alongside another local Liberal Democrat blogger Will Howells, surely a double Southwark first for the channel... Come on Cllr Thomas... it's time for your screen test...
Political TV fans (and No Geek Is An Island fans, of course) will be delighted to hear that I’m returning to internet TV station 18 Doughty Street tonight, along with fellow LibDem blogger Andy Mayer. We’ll be on air from 9pm. If you can’t tune in tonight, you should be able to watch all three shows [...]
I had one of those eureka moments last night when something that had been taxing me made sense and I was able to put two and two together and make four. A few weeks ago some constituents contacted me ...
Cllr Columba Blango, Liberal Democrat Executive Member for Communities, Equalities and Citizenship on Southwark Council, today called on Immigration Minister Liam Byrne to ensure that the Government provided proper funding for new immigrants to the UK and to the borough for the services it provides to them. Cllr Blango was speaking at a citizenship ceremony for new immigrants held in Southwark Council Chamber at which the Minister was a guest. “Southwark is a multi-culture, multi-ethnic and multi-religious community,” said Cllr Columba Blango. “We take pride in our diversity because it makes us who we are. We are also a welcoming ...
Heather is in the UK. She came to visit last night, having surprised her father at his birthday party on Friday night. I'm not sure she'll come again, as this morning she was locked in the loo and had to climb out of a window to get out. Apparently she had been shouting for ages to get my attention, before her bid for freedom. I didn't hear her. Too busy on the phone with journos wanting to know about Daisy Angus!
Back in January I reported on a case of "extreme gardening" in Falcon View, Badger Farm. Readers with long memories will recall that Hampshire County Council contractors turned up unannounced and removed a planted bed in this quiet residential close. With the help of County Councillor Charlotte Bailey, we were just able to prevent them from laying tarmac over the site. Anyway, restitution has
Eleanor Burnham is calling for St David's Day to become a global festival, like St Paddy's. This sounds fine to me (I like those leeks and daffodils). And St David's is at least early enough to keep clear of Easter most of the time (it clashed with Ash Wednesday the other year though). I'm not sure that it is really about to take off globally though. Wales has exported fewer people than Ireland (someone will correct me now) and they don't privilege their Welsh ancestry in qjuite the same way (except for Tom Shanklin, etc). I can't ...
Politics.co.uk has this up at the moment: "Cameron urges people to be nice to each other".
If only it were true! But reading Labour's leaflets in Lib Dem held Crawcrook and Greenside ward, you would be forgiven for believing the Lib Dems ran the council. And what makes the situation even more amusing is that Labour are backing a petition against a decision taken by, errrr, the Labour Party! It all comes down to a road junction in the village of Greenside. It's not the happiest of
Well, I have just hit the milestone of 50,000 viewings of my videos on YouTube. Still in the lead is Copacabana Beach on 5280. Of my top 10 videos, 9 are ones I shot whilst travelling abroad. The only non-travel one in the top ten is the one I filmed about an opencast proposal for my council ward in Gateshead. At 999 viewings, I just need one more to reach 4 figures! If anyone feels the urge to
And now in overseas news: concern about global warming has doubled in the US according to ABC (and full credit to ABC in that story for distinguishing between small, statistically insignificant changes in poll results from those that really are significant; there’s a lesson there for many UK media outlets).
Some young Lib Dems will know that Gez Smith had some work by the artist Banksy in his possession. Today, Channel Four News. reports on the impending sale of the iconic piece, Riot Green. Gez is a lucky bastard, and next time we visit the Crown Inn, he can buy me a pint of cider and a sandwich. I like Banksy’s work, it's funny and provocative. There are some nice examples around my office, but my favourite is on Park Street, Bristol (see left). Wandering past it last Friday night, I couldn’t help but think how smart and far sighted ...
I have listened with irritated boredom to the Conservatives endlessly banging on about bias against them in the BBC. *yawn* However this story on the BBC website about David Cameron makes me think they might be right. One single paragraph heading summed up Cameron's performance on the Today Programme and on television. Quite rude to point it out so clearly though.
The Times has an article today about how a cancer clusters have been identified around mobile phone masts. Quick! Panic! Or don’t. I’m frankly amazed that, even taking into account the general appalling reporting of science in the UK press, that a journalist would fall for that one. The story is about [...]
Today is the day that the English celebrate our Patron Saint’s Day in the way that only the English know how; by pretending that we’re not allowed to. Every whinging, grumpy bore in the land will enjoy a day of frenzied, onanistic self-pity, decrying the fact that malevolent forces (the council, the EU, the Tony Blairs) are stopping him from celebrating the day. His rant will probably end with the confident and incisive assertion that as a white, middle-class Anglo-Saxon man he is actually the only person in the universe with no rights at all. Aah, bet you hadn’t considered ...
South from the city to Colma again, for more time with Walter and family, before heading to Palo Alto for an evening with the Wilens. Rob and Stefanie are old family friends, and I’ve had the pleasure of watching their three sons, Nathan, Henry and Jesse, grow up over the years. Unexpectedly, my visit was timed to coincide with Henry’s 11th birthday party with his grandparents, in from
The Westminster Hour got quite rowdy last night. The topics were: the Labour Leadership, Lord Goldsmith (cash for peerages) and Cameron's debacle over Greg Dyke. On Lord Goldsmith - he is in an untenable position with regard to cash for peerages being the Attorney General, a donor to the Labour party and a lord. He must not be the person who accepts or rejects the recommendations that come
One of the problems with having a Welsh Assembly in which no one party has an overall majority and where there is a great deal of consensus about most things, is that it becomes more difficult to achieve clear differentiation and to take credit for the many benefits that devolution has brought. Nevertheless, Labour has tried it today with a breathtaking claim that a "representative family" is £5,000 richer with the "devolution dividend" and that this is entirely down to them. There are a whole series of questions about what is a 'representative family' and how the figure ...
Dear Mr Khalid Mahmood MP,
So I made my plane, I don’t think that I forgot anything (famous last words!) and the jetlag isn’t too bad… yet. The pressures of day to day life left behind, I can concentrate on having some fun for a while. It wasn’t a bad flight, although United Airlines need to do something about the inflight entertainment on their Boeing 747’s. No seatback, rather dull movies and insufficient radio choices
I have long been keen on baseball, and usually catch a game when I’m here in the US. Fortunately, the Giants were scheduled to be playing at AT&T Park, one of the newer ballparks in a prime location down by the bay, and at home to the 2006 World Series winners, the Cardinals, too. So, jetlag partly recovered from, I wandered over to the Willie Mays Gate, picked up a ticket for the game, and
Awesome. The Dirty Pretty Things gig tonight for Make Roads Safe was just awesome. Again. Hot Club de Paris were good again and DPTs as always were excellent. The big bonus tonight was the appearance on stage of Tim Burgess (i.e. from The Charlatans), singing a DPT song - actually singing from lyrics on a piece of paper - and then a Charlies song too. Ok, it was North Country Boy, which is one of my least favourite of theirs, but it was still great. With the Dirty Pretty Things being one of the best bands ...
Did you know that there are 5 hospitals in the UK run by the NHS exclusively dedicated to homoeopathic "treatment"? What is worse is that a significant proportion of the UK's population (championed by the anachronism which is Charles Windsor) which believe that homoeopathy actually works, despite any supporting evidence. It, along with so-called alternative medicine courses at some universities, are diverting money away from already cash-strapped hospitals and colleges. Sign the petition to end taxpayer's money going towards this dangerous distraction from medicine that actually works. "There is no alternative medicine. There is only medicine that works ...
Sandwiched between political activities in Westminster and Camden, I was glad to get to Leo Abse’s 90th birthday lunch at his quintessentially English house on the riverfront at Strand on the Green, Chiswick. Leo is otherwise quintissentially Welsh, a pugnacious, pint-sized individualist who probably did more than any other single British Member of Parliament to [...]
Stonch has left a comment on an earlier story of mine. It links to a posting on his own blog which confirms that the customers of the Lewes Arms have won their campaign to have Harvey's restored to the pub. Cheers. | < | April 2007 | > | ||||
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