{Gallery 37 Birmingham} Tomorrow sees the launch of the latest project from the folks at Gallery 37, Birmingham's creative arts training organisation. Every summer, for nearly a decade, Gallery 37 has been delivering a high-profile, city centre based programme of training in visual, applied and performing arts. Collaborating with many of the city's major arts organisations, Gallery 37 employs professional artists to work with young people, many of whom have never been to an arts venue or event before. The 2009 project will convert two vacant retail units in the Pavilions shopping centre into creative workshops for 16-24 year-olds. They ...
Computer Weekly has the story: Nine staff have been sacked from their local authority jobs for snooping on personal records of celebrities and personal acquaintances held on the core database of the government's National Identity Scheme. They are among 34 council workers who illegally accessed the Customer Information System (CIS) database, which holds the biographical data of the population that will underpin the government's multi-billion-pound ID card programme. Further details are in the full story. Hat-tip: Ideal Government
From the Great Yarmouth Mercury: The former leader and current chairman of North Norfolk District Council, Simon Partridge, has been elected to stand as the Liberal Democrat prospective parliamentary candidate for Yarmouth.Mr Partridge, a magistrate in Yarmouth for the past 10 years, was born in nearby Caister and went to school locally. For the last eight years he and his wife have run a bed-and-breakfast business in Catfield.
Parliament is now in recess. The length of holidays our MPs take does somewhat beggar belief. Still an opportunity to review the performance of Blaydons current Labour MP. Has his record changed? Here's the latest summary of ghis voting record on the nuetral website www.theyworkforyou.com Voted a mixture of for and against a transparent Parliament. votes, speeches Voted very strongly for introducing a smoking ban. votes, speeches Voted very strongly for introducing ID cards. votes, speeches Voted very strongly for Labour's anti-terrorism laws. votes, speeches Voted very strongly against an investigation into the Iraq war. votes, speeches Voted very strongly ...
St Albans Abbey yesterday From that excellent newspaper the St Albans & Harpenden Review: The future of MP Anne Main has sparked a civil war among St Albans Conservatives.Chairman Seema Kennedy and her two deputies, Matt Peck and Mary Zambra, asked Mrs Main to step down, and have now called a meeting of the local party's 300 members on August 13, to vote on her de-selection.But an opposing faction is backing the MP and trying to remove Mrs Kennedy and Mr Peck from their posts ahead of the crucial vote.Defying clear advice from the party's regional campaign director that it ...
Clicking on this website and answering the questions told me I am a Lib Dem. Interestingly my third choice is apparently "Green". Funny that as I don't support their policy of allowing people to stay out of work and earning a "citizens income" with no compulsion to work, I don't believe in the nationalisation of supermarkets and I don't support green plans to abolish stem cell research.
For many months, I have highlighted the safety concerns about the dreadful pathway around the former Homebase site on Riverside Drive. Click on the headline above to view an earlier blog entry on this concern. Last night's "Evening Telegraph" covered the assault and robbery of one of my constituents on the pathway. I spoke with her on Sunday; it was a terrible experience for this lady and it reinforces my view (and hers) that the temporary pathway is unsafe and must be replaced with a safer, less claustrophobic, path. I am meeting with a representative of the City Council's Legal ...
So I've been away for a week, and confirmed every opinion I already held about going on beach holidays (they're really not for me). Before I went, I listed a load of possible posts I might make, and asked which ones people were interested in. One that more people seemed to want to see than [...]
All over Britain there are Labour MPs with small majorities who know that they will lose their seats when the general election comes. Some have reacted to this by announcing that they will not fight again. Others are generally doing the decent thing by agreeing to fly the Labour flag at the election, while all the time putting out feelers about new employment afterwards. One Liberal Democrat MP is combining the two approaches in a manner all his own. Step forward Mark Oaten. Last year Oaten floated the idea that he might stand down before the general election and force ...
Whilst over at Sadie's Tavern, I noticed the "... and if you're REALLY bored ..." and decided to click on a link from under it which took me to her normblog profile. As I was bored I did have the time and put in the effort to read it, and I have to say I enjoyed it. My favourite bit was: and don't get involved in interminable boasting about how the days of the 'dead tree press' are numbered now you've got an account on blogger and provided your mum with the URL.Now I have to say that is exactly ...
Yes, for those few of you who still visit here who aren't bots, I've given the blog a new look as the old one was starting to look a bit dated. As I've promised many times before, I'm going to try and blog a bit more frequently again in future just so my status as Possibly Britain's Oldest Liberal Democrat Blog Still In Existence* is a bit more than a theoretical one, and going to all the effort of redesigning** might be sufficient to nudge me into that. Everything seems to be working fine with the new layout for me, ...
BBC's newsround today reported on the death of a prized carp which had apparently been poisoned by uncooked nuts. The carp was well loved by anglers and the editor of the Anglers Mail was asked to comment. He did so magnificently, noting that this carp was the fishing world's Michael Jackson. I went straight out and bought a hat so that I could take it off to this fine journalist for his amazing front.
You really couldn't make this up could you? So, STV are reporting that the Annual Report produced by the Scottish Parliament was contracted to a UK firm who in turn sub-contracted it out to a firm in India who sub-contracted the translation to someone in the Western Isles! I am English, but I really feel Gaelic is a really important part of the culture here. Our annual holidays from a really early age were always in the Highlands especially Ullapool, Sheigra and Kinlochbervie and Gaelic was a core part of life in those areas and must never be forgotten. So, ...
I've just received the genda for next week's meeting of the Tory/Independent Cabinet. One item is on the new community network areas. These were designed to ensure that the new unitary council has localism at its centre. It appears that somebody wants them scrapped. As I've blogged before, the danger of the new Cornwall Council is that it would centralise everything in Truro. For those of us in Launceston, it may as well be London. So the community network areas and the panels that will form their hub are vital. But the Cabinet's plan appears to be to put these ...
{SHOUT logo} I've just heard today that the inaugral SHOUT Festival has been awarded a grant from Sport England through their Small Grants programme. This adds to the grant already received from the Arts Council. SHOUT is the first of its kind in Birmingham, a cultural festival celebrating and showcasing the growing, vibrant LGBT community. The first festival, to be held during November 2009, features visual arts, performance arts, sports and community events. I was invited by the organisers, the Birmingham LGBT Community Trust, to head up the sports strand following my previous experience in founding and developing Birmingham Blaze ...
{Vel'oh!} How do you like my new wheels? We spent this weekend in Brussels and Luxembourg, having managed to get some cheap Eurostar tickets. I'd been to Brussels before, but Luxembourg was new territory, and I have to say I really enjoyed it. Luxembourg City doesn't have a tram or metro system (though there are plans for a new tram line) so to get around, we used their excellent Vel'Oh! scheme. The concept's the same as the more famous Paris Velib scheme. You pick up a bike from one of several locations in the City, and can use it for ...
There's a free dog micro-chipping day next Wednesday (12th August) in Manor Park. It's absolutely free for dogs owned by Lewisham residents. Microchipping is a safe, permanent form of ID that can help reunite owners with their dogs should they become lost or stolen. The microchipping session will be held on Wednesday 12 August from 12 - 4 pm on board the Waste Education Trailer, which will be parked in Manor Park. If you want to get your dog chipped, take along: Proof of ownership such as a bill, vet card or pedigree papers Proof you live in the borough, ...
The Liberal Democrats have hit on a topic that I have been commenting on extensively in recent blog posts. In proposals outlined yesterday, they address clearly some of the reasons that lead to girls and women having unrealistic expectations around their apperance. In calling for airbrushing in children advertisements to be banned and flagged up in adult advertisements, they have taken an important step in tackling the corrupt culture that promotes the flawed conception of what expectations women should meet. However, in response, the Advertising Standards Authority said that there are few complaints about airbrushing: "Consumers know there has been ...
The Prime Minister has too much time on his hands, and is therefore going to do voluntary work to try and waste some time. If I was an advisor to the Prime Minister I wouldn't have come out with a silly idea like the voluntary work one as it's not going to do Brown any good and he rather spend his time reading a book, or even a blog but voluntary work can not win elections. Clearly Number 10 needs a new advisor to give them election winning tips. Maybe Labour needs to bring Alastair Campbell back, or can he ...
Tue 4th
19:08
"According to Government figures, unless net migration is reduced by 75%, the UK's population will h...
The Government's new points-based system for managing migration may favour recent graduates with paper qualifications over workers with long professional experience and ability, a report warned today. The House of Commons Home Affairs Committee gave a "cautious welcome" to the implementation of the system, introduced last year, which is intended to ensure that migrants from [...]
Politics Home has details of this poll which shows a considerable support for reducing military commitments. Even 53% of Labour supporters took the view that the moral authority of the UK on the international stage was weakened by it's foreign policy. Overall only 30% took either an equivocal or supportive view that either the UK's [...]
So Iain Dale thinks the publicity stunt by the Conservatives in a constituency by holding an Open Primary is a good idea, no surprise there then! Clearly the Conservatives with this stunt have shown that they have more money then sense, why do a political party need to pull a trick like this to promote a candidate who might get a run for her money by the Lib Dems. The Tories as I correctly read have held an Open Primary, and asked the general public to decide which candidate from a list of three they will pick to stand as ...
We have been in talks with partner agencies and fellow councillors to try to get a Local Boxing Gym more excess-able to the kids. Along with our ideas of getting a local football club to generate a wider appeal also. We firmly believe as a council we should be buying into services like this to generate [...]
The announcement today from Totnes of the winner of the Tories' first 'open primary' – in which the party's Parliamentary candidate has been chosen not by party members, but by over 16,000 voters in the constituency – will prompt all political parties to ask the simple question: is this the future? The arguments in its favour are obvious, both in terms of 'democratic renewal' and canny campaigning: it has provoked national interest; the 25% turnout suggests an appetite among the electorate; the winning candidate has a genuine mandate; her name recognition will have been boosted; there has been communication with ...
Forgive me for scoffing at the Conservative Party holding open primaries, but for me these do nothing for the democratic process as a whole an instead are a means of buying lots of publicity for the Tory party whilst giving a pretence of being at the leading edge of reform of the political system. The cost of the Totnes open primary is reported to be in excess of £40000. This is a cost that Lib Dem and Labour constituency parties cannot afford. So instantly this idea is a one sided affair, with the Tories using their Ashcroft money (when will ...
I four or so year ago received a fine for littering, I know, I know what the person at the back is saying but at the time I was a naïve young man who didn't know his elbow from his a**. The litter fine has lead to the local council sending me a letter today apologising for fining me and asking me to fill in a questionnaire about litter in Pendle. First of all, I would like to ask which genius came up with that idea, clearly a bad idea to ask that of someone who is an offender. Would ...
In Islam you are thought to not knock back an offer unless you have no other option, and that recently became the case when I knocked back an offer by the Sunlight Centre for Open Politics to join them at the Westminster Arms for a meet up. The meet up was organised for bloggers, journalists and anyone who supported the campaigns they were running but because I don't work, live or have any business to take care of in London can not attend. I also can not attend because I don't drink and the meet up was in a pub! ...
As some of you may know, Malc and his friend Audrey are running the Loch Ness Marathon in just 61 days' time to raise money for the Multiple Sclerosis Society Scotland. I am supposed to be Chief Spin Doctor, er, I mean Publicist for this effort and was conscious that while they have been training hard, I've not done a huge amount for them. They did get some press coverage in Malc's home local paper, the Banffshire Herald which you can see on their Facebook Group. Since they decided they were going to do this around a month ago, they ...
Well myself and mole junior met with Cllr Merry today to discuss a range of issues within Swinton South. The meeting was productive and again we felt he offered an ear and took on board our concerns. On the whole he suffers a lot of bad press but when we have asked for help he [...]
Tue 4th
18:13Well this morning we received a Letter from tenants thanking us for our help in getting alley gating...
It's great when we can help. and we will do what ever we can in any areas of Swinton South. My only concern is how sad our society as become when this site is becoming the norm.
I remember this in the late 60s when my Grandfather moved to Hume. At the time they used the words Slum. I am really sorry but if we are to look for a better home standard then this is not it. The people i visited today where told to leave their windows open. What do [...]
In responding to a message on Twitter I have just worked out that there are now twelve Assembly Members with Twitter accounts. Including myself these include Leighton Andrews, Bethan Jenkins, Jonathan Morgan, Darren Millar, Nerys Evans, Kirsty Williams, Huw Lewis, Jocelyn Davies, Carwyn Jones, Leanne Wood (twice) and Jeff Cuthbert. Not all of them are active or use it on any regular basis but clearly they or their staff see the social networking site as useful although two have never posted a single tweet. Are there any more out there? Update: Make that 13, there is Carl Sargeant as well. ...
I'm spending a week in Manchester for various reasons - both business and pleasure. On Saturday I had sufficient time to stroll around this august city and breathe in some of its history and architecture. Standing at the site of the Peterloo Massacre (right) was a particular, poignant, highlight. I also enjoyed visiting the magnificient Museum of Science and Industry and the People's Museum. The latter is currently being hosted by the former, during refurbishment (of the latter). For a namby pampby Southern wimp such as myself, it was wonderful to imbibe the majesty of Manchester's architecture and the grit ...
Last time I had a good old rant about how our tax system, even after 12 years of supposedly socialist government, still inexplicably favours the well-off. I think anybody would be right to share my anger at this, and in my opinion it is reason enough to disqualify any government, especially a Labour one. But how should it be fixed? For starters, we need to redraw the tax bands to make the system truly progressive, not just the half-hearted attempt we have now. In times gone by, the average earner paid very little in tax, as one might expect. Today, ...
Vince Cable the Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman today warned that government "embarrassment" over the nationalised Northern Rock, could mean a quick sale of the lender which would be a bad deal of taxpayers. "The government has always been embarrassed by the fact it had to nationalise it," he said. "It wants to show the market that it is going back to business as...
We have reported the matter that many areas of Twerton have not had there Garden or Cardboard collected again today. We have asked the council to chase this matter up and have been promised that it will be collected on wednesday this week.
Tue 4th
16:49
One in five children failing in English as Sats results fall for first time in 15 years
Ahead of today's results, the Liberal Democrats predicted they would reveal that more than half a million children have left primary school unable to read or write since Labour came to power in 1997. Recent trends showed those with no 'useful literacy' at the age of 11 - failing to reach Level 3 - running at around 35,000 a year, enough to send the total over the 500,000 mark this...
Mike Smithson has a piece on the result of the Totnes open primary which saw Dr Sarah Wollaston elected as the Conservative candidate. The turnout was 24.6% which Smithson says puts it on a par with US primaries. In his piece Smithson rightly makes the point that it might give voters in safe seats a [...]
One of my sisters sent me a family tree of one part of our family recently, my father's forebears, the Sidaway family. I've just been doing some research on some of them. My father's cousin, Walter Robson-Cross, was drowned when the SS Ceramic was sunk by a German U-boat in 1942. He had been my grandfather's dental assistant and I think Walter had lived with my father's family as a boy so they were almost like brothers. One of my father's second cousins is Marlene Sidaway, an actress who has had parts in some very well known productions such as ...
I am somewhat surprised to hear the news that senior officials at the Palace of Westminster have been rewarded with rather chunky pay rises. I have, in the recent past, been somewhat critical of the Fees Office of the House of Commons, which appears to have had a policy of agreeing any claim that crossed its desk. However, there is no way to make this look good. It may be that the pay rise awarded to Andrew Walker is perfectly justified, although 9% is really rather in excess of the Government's declared 2% limit. However, in a now much more ...
Thanks to Red Maria over at Dolphinarium (http://dolphinarium.blogspot.com/) for the following article relating to the attacks on David Kerr, SNP candidate in the forthcoming Glasgow by-election).There is no place for religious-based bigotry however it manifests itself. Sounds of the brakes being slammed on and the screeching of tires as the car is put into a sharp reverse in Glasgow. Spokesmen for the Labour and Conservatives parties told the Scottish Catholic Observer this week the politicians had been misquoted, their comments taken out of context, and that neither believed that membership of Opus Dei would bar a candidate from public office.This ...
Figures published today show that fewer 11 year olds have reached Level 4 in English, the standard expected for their age group. A fifth of 11 year olds did not achieve this level, in the tests taken in May. The drop in results is the first since Sats tests were introduced in 1995. From the Daily Mail: "The depressing figures come despite Labour investing billions over the past decade in literacy and numeracy drives. This September alone, around four in ten children – almost 220,000 – are expected to move up to secondary school without sufficient mastery of the three ...
From the BBC: China 'trusts prostitutes more'. The article is better reading than the vacuously incomplete headline. I particularly appreciate the placing of real estate developers near the bottom. My overall reaction, though, is "Are we surprised by anything on this list?" Answer: "No".
More a capella excellence! Thank goodness the lyrics are now revealed! And helpfully captioned so you can sing along. Posted via email from Helen Duffett's posterous
Tue 4th
13:34This one takes the biscuit, I feel for this couple perhaps these jobs worth idiots should think and ...
Fined £86 for extra time with baby's coffinOfficials at a crematorium run by Milton Keynes council have been criticised for fining a grieving couple after they spent 'too long' with the coffin of their deceased five-week-old baby. Last night a spokesman for the council said it was 'sorry' for making the extra charge. He said: [...]
£80 fine for extra rubbishPeople putting out extra bags of rubbish in Oxford risk being given an £80 fine. Cllr John Tannard said: "We are getting tough on excess rubbish because it is messy, a hazard for binmen and it costs us money." If course Rubbish is Messy.
My second rant of the day is about the departure from competition of Strictly Come Dancing professional Karen Hardy. I first found out yesterday, via Sara. Honestly, I went out for the first time in weeks for a couple of hours and in that time the stories came out about both Karen and Nelson Piquet Jr. I've already had a complete hissy fit about the sacking, sorry, putting out to grass, of Arlene Phillips. Karen is 39, and is being replaced by a 25 year old despite her obvious talent for clever choreography. She joined the show in 2005, quickly ...
Can anyone think of a legal way for me to obtain £118,000 quickly? There's a house two streets away come up for sale because the owner has sadly passed away, it's twice the size of the tiny hovel we live in now (literally, as it looks to have been made by knocking two houses of the same size as this one together), which means there would be room for {[info - personal] } matgb and I to have babies; it has a garden (and a shed!) and space for secure motorbike parking, and it's just all-round perfect. It's cheap for ...
The UK-born Thai Prime Minister, Abhisit Vejjajiva, turned 45 yesterday and as is the custom in these parts, he received presents from his political colleagues as well as from friends and family. The latter were comparatively modest: an iPod from his wife and a panda doll (sic) from one of his children. A rather embarrassed-looking fellow [...]
Vince Cable talking to Stephanie Flanders, discussing what to do if the tuition fee cap were lifted to £10,000, says "We do have to be realistic . . . we can't simultaneously promise free education for everybody and then have unrestricted access. One has to choose - either wide access for which there is co-financing or else you can have free tuition but for a limitied pool of students"Yes. And, in my silly old economically liberal way, I tend to regard the quantity rationing as illiberal (think Soviet bread queues) and price-rationing (even though heavily deferred and subsidized) as the ...
From the BBC: The Lib Dems' Treasury spokesman Lord Oakeshott said he would be asking Lords authorities what address Lord Taylor claimed for between 2001 and 2007. Lord Taylor told the newspaper he regarded the property in the West Midlands as his main home. The Sunday Times alleged Lord Taylor claimed more than £70,000 in overnight allowances between 2001 and 2007 on the basis that his mother's home in the West Midlands was his main home. The paper claimed the house was in fact sold in 2001 after his mother's death – but Lord Taylor said he regarded it as ...
{bank} There is something really rather annoying about Barclay's and HSBC's financial results... Barclays has announced an 8% rise in first-half profits, boosted by its investment banking division. Pre-tax profits for the first six months came in at £2.98bn ($5bn), although this was slightly below analysts' forecasts ... HSBC reported half-year profits of $5bn, although this was about half what it made in the same period a year ago. And it's not that a bunch of cough-bankers are going to get some rather nice bonuses this Christmas. It's that we actually fell for the Government line that if we didn't ...
Ten years ago, the government launched the Teenage Pregnancy Strategy, a programme aiming to halve the incidence of teen pregnancy by 2010. Not unfairly, social affairs commentator Rosemary Bennett calls it 'a policy disaster'. The UK has the highest teenage pregnancy rate in Western Europe, and prevalence of sexually transmitted infection (STI) is on the rise as well. Why? Comparing the UK with the United States, which shows a teenage pregnancy rate almost double that of the UK and increasing rates of sexually transmitted infections, with the Netherlands, which has been much more successful reveals how sex education, public information ...
My blog has apparently jumped another 10 places in the August Wikio rankings to supposedly be the 17th most influential political blog in the country (21st most influential across all blogs) according to Charlotte Gore's sneak preview. I think that's correct - I have had to strip out the non-political ones manually from the preview. I also think this puts me in the number 2 position in the Lib Dem Blogs Wikio list now behind Lib Dem Voice. As usual I feel I should pretty heavily caveat this with the fact that Wikio use a specific algorithm with incoming links ...
If we're to believe the spin from Conservative Central Office, a new chapter in democracy has begun as Totnes Conservative Association in Devon throws open the doors of the musty old party system and allows the voters of Totnes - every last one of them, whether or not they support the Tories - to vote in choosing their candidate for the next General Election. In reality it's nothing of the sort; but it is an interesting campaigning tactic. Here's how it works. Totnes is a marginal constituency where the Tories have just about managed to hold off the Lib Dem ...
Organ donation is a subject I have felt passionately about since a young age. I can't remember when I joined the national organ donor register but I'm pretty certain it was below the age of eleven. I lost my donor card at the time, probably because my wallet contained other important documents, such as tazos (remember them?) and some chewing gum that was 'good for another couple of hours later'. But it isn't an issue that I spontaneously became aware of. It was something that at a young age my parents had discussed with me, probably following a news item ...
I have spent a lot of time on this blog bemoaning the Government's policy of collecting as much DNA as possible on a database and the implications this has for civil liberties. I even have outstanding freedom of information requests to the Welsh police forces to establish how many minors and innocent people they are holding DNA samples on. Despite this I have never really been a conspiracy sort of person preferring to attribute strange coincidences and unacceptable practices to cock-ups rather than the often more obvivious option. Paranoia can often follow otherwise. It is heartening therefore to have my ...
Dwylo Cerrig remembers Tryweryn and asks if the writing should be on the wall for government sponsored graffiti. Recession ensures that government policy is the language of priorities. Balancing the books, picking which pet project deserves feeding, often leaves ministers between a rock and a hard place. That is, unless you're Alun Ffred Jones, and your priority is a rock in a hard to find place (the A487). It is a peculiar trait of Celtic national sentiment that stones become rocks of ages, geological ties to either times in the sunshine or paperweights holding down a page of colonial history ...
Back in December 1994 The Guardian ran a piece on "The tomorrow of newspapers" complete with a mocked up newspaper from December 2004. The picture on the right shows the cover, and click on it to see pictures of the other pages. As you'll see it is very much a magazine look they were predicting. But it was also a personalised newspaper as their report from the year 2004, written in 1994, explained: It did not take long before people realised they were receiving too much information. Many began to depend on "agents" (filtering elements contained in computers which shape ...
It has been brought to my attention that there are another three by-elections pending in he West Midlands.
As we're on the subject of Council meetings, I should begin this post by declaring a personal interest in that I know both the Councillors mentioned in this story, and indeed have campaigned for both of them to be elected - though I would stress that Rene was a Liberal Democrat at the time I was campaigning for him. I am also someone who has Twittered during Council meetings, which is probably the most relevant part to this discussion, as I really don't see what Peter or Rene has done as being wrong. For me, using Twitter is a way ...
Here's the sneak preview of August's UK blog rankings, provided by those kind people at Wikio. This is the overall ranking, although typically political blogs still dominate. No change in the top two, again, but then Iain's much better at generating incoming links than Guido. A shake-up of technology blogs means Boing Boing and Engadget jump to 3 and 4, and Blah! Blah! Technology drops out of the top 10. Further down it looks like my (very) brief stint as Lib Dem number two is at an end. I'd better update my sidebar. Congrats to Mark Thompson of the 'Mark ...
I often wonder how I can celebrate being English, and indeed being British, without idiots like the BNP thinking I'm on their side. But it's no good keeping quiet just because *they* happen to be waving *my* flag. So I thought I might state from time to time things I'm proud of, without any implication of scorning other peoples and what they might be proud of. Now here is something to to be very proud of. I've been to many, many stately places and national monuments, but few made me feel the way Bletchley Park did. British codebreaking and British ...
Du procès en cours de la scientologie au nouveau débat sur le port de la burqa, l'Etat cherche à réglementer toujours davantage le fait religieux. Alternative Libérale rappelle l'importance de la liberté de conscience et dénonce cette immixtion de plus en plus importante dans les pratiques religieuses qui ne relèvent que de la vie privée et ne devraient pas être pénalisées ou prohibées. Les attaques répétées de l'Etat et de la justice contre l'organisation dite de l'Eglise de Scientologie ne font pas honneur à notre République laïque. Alors que de nombreuses démocraties, parmi nos plus proches voisines et alliées, reconnaissent ...
People who want to become British citizens could speed it up by becoming active members of political parties and trade unions, under government plans. (source: bbc news online) Non-EU immigrants - the only immigrants that the Government has any power over are a source of revenue (the fees charged at each step are repulsive in their rapacity, says Devil's Kitchen), a source of headlines - a collective punching bag for Labour to demonstrate how tough they are and how completely unnecessary it is to vote for the BNP and now, it seems, a handy source of party funding. Now I ...
Nobody who follows Formula One can be particularly surprised that poor Nelson Piquet Jr has been fired by Renault. Speculation about his future at Renault has dogged him almost since he started racing for the team in 2008. The manner of the announcement is, however, surprising. Rather than a terse statement from Renault saying that Nelson is leaving but look at their nice shiny new driver, the news has been made public by a very well crafted tirade at his former boss from Nelson himself. If half of what he says is true, and I believe it's more than that, ...
I know a number of Lib Dems (myself included) who were thrown by the Liberal Democrat Autumn Conference starting a day earlier for the last two years on the Saturday and finishing on the Wednesday. In the past, whilst many of us always arrived at conference on a Saturday, the majority of the conference began [...]
Jo Swinson was on the TV this morning saying that the airbrushing of photos aimed at children should be banned and that other images which have been altered should carry some form of warning to indicate what has been done to them. Is this a ridiculous suggestion as Tom Papworth and Paul Walters seem to think? On balance I think it is. And here's why. Jo's campaign splits into two sections: - that images aimed at adults should carry a strapline to say what alterations have been made to the original image. This is just impossible. You could carry a ...
Over at Wales Home, Daran Hill discusses the state of play with regards to gender balance in the National Assembly for Wales. He concludes: Indeed, only in the Welsh Liberal Democrats can the issue of gender representation be said to be settled at the moment. It remains an issue in Plaid, is emerging as a key concern for the Conservatives and is a central discussion point in Welsh Labour both in terms of future candidate selections and in terms of the election for Rhodri Morgan's successor, whether or not a woman candidate ultimately stands. He is right to be concerned ...
Well it made me laugh.
We're not quite sure what Conservative Party Chair Eric Pickles means when he suggests that many Local Authority Chief Executives could be abolished. In an interview with the Independent yesterday morning Mr Pickles said "recent changes to the structure of local government meant many chief executives were no longer needed. Since 2000, many councils have switched to having a leader and elected...
Here's the "Call my Euro-bluff" section from an episode of QI I stumbled across:
Tue 4th
08:49Mr DEE OR MR DUM Conservatives or Labour hard to choose or is it? There is one more choice.think abo...
Looking back on who's been reading and getting a few surprises. Shame they don't feel like making a comment. Perhaps it's difficult to defend the last Thatcher government. But keep on reading perhaps i may tempt you to voice your opinion. It always worries me when you put out comments that i feel need a [...]
On Sunday this blog will again be hosting the Britblog Roundup. If over the next week you see a posting on a British blog that you think particularly find, please send the URL to britblog [AT] gmail [DOT] com and I shall include it in the roundup. Nominating a posting for the Britiblog Roundup is a good way of promoting a blog that you think deserves more readers. And you are welcome to nominate a posting on your own blog too. All nominations by Sunday lunchtime please.
2 Big Stories The joint committee of MPs and peers on human rights is calling for an independent review of the evidence that British intelligence officers were complicit in torture: The Joint Human Rights Committee said it was unable to establish whether British officers were involved in mistreatment of suspects. It also criticised ministers and the head of MI5 for refusing to testify at parliamentary hearings on the claims. Meanwhile, Northern Rock has posted losses for its tax-payer owners of £724m: The Newcastle-based bank, which is to be split into so-called good and bad banks, admitted that many customers were ...
I agree with Tom Papworth on Liberal Vision. Banning airbrushing of models in adverts when they are aimed at minors? Come off it. It's silly. Really silly. (Please read Tom's piece for a more thoughtful discussion of this, and read on if you want an ignorant and confused rant). Whether or not to ban something is not a simple judgment, of course. There is a case for banning when, for example, public safety is badly and clearly at risk (and I accept in the case of the young and image sensitivity, it is). Ralph Nader's advocacy of the automatic window ...
Hats off to the Conservative Party for trying to involve more people in politics with their full postal ballot in Totnes to select a candidate to take on Lib Dem challenger Julian Brazil at the next e...
The number two from the British Tehran embassy yesterday attended the endorsement ceremony of President Ahmadinejad by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. This was the disputed election that Iran has also heavily accused Britain of leading the populist opposition against in June. The FCO seem to think that sending the number two, Patrick Davies the deputy head of mission instead of the Ambassador Simon Glass was enough to show the regime that this was not business as usual, claiming that we need to talk to the regime about its nuclear programme, human rights and other issues. But others think it was too ...
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