I wish we had been able to webcast last nights council meeting. If transparency is going to be the way that our citizens hold us to account then we have an obligation to make our deliberations accessible. Many of the old guard bleated away about parliament being televised but it has done away with some boorish behavior. The silly things that elected people say ought to be known to their electors as should the contructive and ones. I suspect that webcasting council meetings would give folk cause to weigh their contributions more carefully. You can see what I mean by ...
There's an in-depth, wide-ranging and pretty frank interview with Nick Clegg in The Guardian today, in which he defends the coalition, assures those Lib Dem activists worried by the budget cuts that they are "not driven by some ideological zeal", and attacks Labour for its failure to recognise that coalitions are here to stay: "Something very, very big is happening in politics." Here are some of the juiciest Clegg-bites: On the coalition: [it] is not an aberration, but a natural consequence of what has been happening for years, which is a loosening of the old tribal ties between the old ...
I blogged on Wednesday about being on an inspection carried out by the Port of Tyne Health Authority. I said I would post up a few photos. Here they are:This is the Gateshead Millennium Bridge fully opened. A spectacular sight at any time but I understand the bridge is opened every day at midday during the summer. To the left is the Sage, Gateshead. This will be the location of the Lib Dem spring
Tonight was one of the more pleasant in recent weeks with an event organised by Woking LibDems with speakers Mark Pack and Philip Goldenburg talking to us about campaigning and the coalition respectively. Mark Pack, one of the main editors on Lib Dem Voice gave an excellent talk on ways that local parties can improve ...
Lib Dem Armed Forces Minister Nick Harvey MP wants a speedy review of alternative funding sources for schools that have lost out in the cuts to the school buildings budget. And he's written to the Tory Education Minister Michael Gove to point that out. A few choice quotes are: "I accept that putting these projects on hold ...
I began my blogging life fairly recently on the subject of BSF (Building Schools for the Future - here) along with a separate entry that day berating Stephen Pound after waking to the radio news one Sunday morning and feeling particularly annoyed by his comments on David Laws. My motivation for the BSF entry was not then anger but concern over many thousands of construction jobs that would be lost if hundreds of schools were cancelled - never expecting that the vast bulk of them would go. I would admit to an interest in the industry from a directly related ...
North Cornwall Lib Dem MP Dan Rogerson has called for North Cornwall to be used to pilot a scheme for a fuel duty rebate for rural areas. In the budget, Chancellor George Osborne announced that the scheme would be consulted on and Dan has written to him asking for the pilot scheme to be North Cornwall. In Dan's letter he says that using a car in North Cornwall was a necessity because of "poor" public transport. Driving in North Cornwall is a necessity since public transport links are inadequate even between the urban centres and completely non-existent when it comes ...
This is a fascinating story concerning Hackney Council's actions after their decision to exclude the election address of Tory mayoral candidate Andrew Boff from the booklet sent to voters before the election in May. It soon escalates to misinforming voters that Mr Boff was not a candidate at all, legal threats and secret taping. The excellent Jack of Kent has the full story.
There's a thing. And I was going to blog about it because, you know, I'm a blogger, and that's what bloggers do. But then I thought: I am knackered. I have been at work all day. The thing can wait. So I don't blog about the thing, thinking I might do it later. Then somebody else blogs about the thing, and they say it much better than I would have done anyway, so I drop the link to their post into my Things to Link To folder and forget about it. But then I think I haven't been blogging enough ...
If ever you needed confirmation of Neil Postman's thesis in his seminal book, 'Amusing Ourselves to Death', watching tonight's farcical coverage of the Raoul Moat story on the BBC News would have been more than enough evidence on its own. Jon Sopel, the squawking, manic anchorman who made such a [IMG: Jon Sopel] nuisance of himself during the election campaign, was utterly beyond parody, making Chris Morris' output during the early 1990s on radio and TV look positively powder-puff, rather than the biting satire it was at the time. Rolling news has always been a dubious medium, concentrating more on ...
Fri 9th
21:53
Consequences for the Northern Ireland Assembly of the coalition's electoral reform proposal
A couple of correspondents have asked me to comment a bit further on the electoral reform proposals for Northern Ireland, and particularly what the consequences will be for the Northern Ireland Assembly. (Much less thought seems to have been given to this in Norn Iron than in Scotland or Wales; see also further debate on the merits of the proposals here.) There are basically two choices. The ratio of six seats per constituency was set in the Good Friday Agreement; but if you go down to 15 constituencies rather than 18, that means going down to 90 members of the ...
The BBC is reporting today that the North East has the highest proportion of personal insolvencies of any region of Britain in 2009. That is to say more people in the region have become bankrupt or made Individual Voluntary Arrangements (IVAs) than in any other region. Within that stark statistic, Derwentside is one of the three areas named as having the highest personal insolvency rates. The BBC's story is here and contains a good deal of information. These are clearly very difficult times, and becoming more difficult. That makes it particularly important that people seek help as soon as possible ...
If you've caught even a minute of the BBC News Channel's tawdry tabloid coverage of the police's hunt for Raoul Moat, you may have noticed the striking resemblance to The Day Today – broadcast an astonishing 16 years ago, and yet still as satirically astute as ever. Here are some of its best bits: That's the funny stuff over and done with. If like me you were repelled by the sight of Jon Sopel's disgustingly mawkish and intrusive coverage – for example, ear-wigging on private telephone conersations between clearly distressed relatives – then you might want to do the following ...
THIRTY DAYS OF DC: 5 Your Favourite Non Masked Character I have a few favourites among the non-mask wearing community of the DCU, and I could have included many of them here, including Alfred, who I still think is the ultimate Star Sapphire. But no, it's got to be Jim Gordon. Jim, who knew what his daughter was up to even when she thought it was a huge huge secret. Jim, who just doesn't care who the Batman is. Commissioner Gordon who pretty much singlehandedly turned the GCPD around and turned it into a force to be reckoned with. A ...
Birkdale Focus reports on Andrew Stunell's meeting with Liberal Democrat councillors at the Local Government Association Conference: "It was interesting that although few doubted the way ahead was going to be rough the number who thought we had made the wrong call was incredibly small." I like his concept of "headless chickens" too. Alex Massie, on the Spectator website, suggests the Liberal Democrat vote could well be more resilient than most pundits suggest. Not only that: "The Tories are supposed to be a pragmatic party: that means they need to take care of the Lib Dems because in helping them ...
There is a possibility that a bid will be made shortly for Northern Rock, the Newcastle based former building society turned mortgage bank turned car crash turned nationalised bank. A group led by Lloyds of London Chairman Lord Levene appears to have plans to take over the company that was the first banking domino to fall that led to massive state intervention in the banking sector to save it,
First, the F-Word tells us we really do all look fine as we are. A message all of us, and particularly women, need to hear. Cicero is back and ready to give his reliably wise and liberal counsel to the Party. It's safe to say Charlotte wasn't overly impressed with the attitude of the Labour Party on Question Time last night. I'm glad I didn't give birth in Leicestershire - but if you did, maybe it's time to see about getting your baby's DNA records removed as Jonathan Calder reports. Spiderplant remembers the events of 7th July 2005
Gorgeous sunset over Oxford, live from my back garden. http://twitpic.com/21uhh1 # Fab (if cruel) cartoon about Nick Clegg, AV and coalition cuts in today's Grauniad from Martin Rowson http://bit.ly/cde5VM # @NickThornsby @caronmlindsay @Wera_Hobhouse Thx for mutual sunset appreciation! # Just writing up what 350 @libdemvoice party members think of the Budget measures and the VAT increase. Interesting. Check out LDV, Mon a.m. # @ICOnews Thx for new online privacy DPA guidleines http://bit.ly/c6N2Y4 – But *please* produce simple PDF version that can be printed. # LD cabinet minister Michael Moore mistaken by Times for anonymous civil servant http://bit.ly/c5dU0F via @ftwestminster # ...
Friday: Poor Mr Michael Borogove! He once said he would willingly give up his seat in the Cabinet so that Mr David Laws could get a place. Looks like this might be his opportunity... It's been a bit of a week for the schools minister, cutting this, cocking-up that, and now getting a pasting from Hard Labour's Mr Bully Balls in a rant about all those cancelled school repairs. What no one seems to have asked, though, is WHY, after thirteen years of "Education, education, education", do we still HAVE one in five school schools in desperate need of rebuilding? ...
Last month there were super updates on Retro Dundee with photos of shopping in Dundee in the 1980s! See : http://tinyurl.com/dundee1980s.
I happen to think that holding the Alternative Vote verses First Past the Post referendum in May is bad timing. Surely it is too early to get the campaign going on winning this Alternative Vote. Is it not too soon after the general election to start running a campaign especially when there are elections in Wales and Scotland. I'm not sure the public or the campaigners are going to be ready for it. I think people need time to consider these elections and we should not only hold this vote later (at least two years later) but to get the ...
The rather superb "You won't find another fool like me"
Further to yesterday's item about the WestFest photographic competition, the folk at WestFest advised me today that the deadline has been extended to 31st July. More details about the competition are available at http://tinyurl.com/westfestphoto.
I cannot resist reproducing this blogpost by Tomos Livingstone in full. It is just priceless: Jacob Rees-Mogg, the recently-elected Conservative MP for North East Somerset, arrived at Westminster with a reputation for being, well, a little old-fashioned. Rees-Mogg, son of a former Times editor, famously stood in the solid Labour seat of Central Fife in 1997, where he attracted a good deal of press attention for taking his nanny with him on the campaign trail. As he put it in a Mail on Sunday interview three years later: "I do wish you wouldn't keep going on about the nanny ... ...
... especially given the paucity of new material on here in the last few weeks, but it would be very, very kind of you if you could vote for me in the Total Politics Best Blogs Poll 2010. [IMG: Click here to vote in the Total Politics Best Blogs Poll 2010] And here are some recommendations for your votes (other than the blog you happen to be reading right now...) Cicero's Songs Wilson's Words The Melangerie Liberal England The Bureau of Sabotage
The most boring, and yet the most intriguing, result at the last election was the one in Scotland. Let me explain. Boring because not a single seat changed hands. Intriguing because not a single seat changed hands. The SNP ran quite an ambitious campaign. They insisted they were on course for as many as 20 ...
Here are the five most popular posts on this blog from the last week in case you missed them: Fixed term parliaments should be 4 years, not 5Rebutting Iain Dale's STV criticismsAnother reason why The Times' paywall experiment will failFive reasons to cheer the timing of the AV referendumNew poll shows 70% of people want cannabis legalised And you should have been reading this excellent piece by Johann Hari which questions whether the media helped trigger Raoul Moat's shooting spree.
Staff and pupils at Moat House, Stockport's Pupil Referral Unit for school-age mums, are delighted with their recent Ofsted inspection, which for the third time found the unit to be "outstanding". The attached nursery was also judged to be "outstanding" in the comprehensive inspection. The Ofsted inspector, who spent two days at the unit, commented that 'Moat House provides an outstanding level of education and care for its students.....students make excellent progress in all subjects'. For more information click here.
A cheery topic I know and in the news because of the dreadful Ashtiani case in Iran. I am worried that Iran expects us to be satisified that death by stoning will instead be replaced by another method of execution. To a huge extent the method is irrelevant. The issue is far simpler: why does the state feel the need to kill someone for a consensual sex act? I am viscerally opposed to the death penalty in any form. I was really pleased when, as part of the Human Rights Act, the last Labour government scrapped the few remaining theoretical ...
If you're in Crieff tomorrow, Saturday 10th July, please spare some time to pop along to a coffee morning to raise funds for the Joshua Deeth Foundation which is being held from 10 am-12 noon at St Fillan's Church Hall, Ford Road, Crieff. See here for map. Joshua Deeth is the son of my friends Nicola and Stephen. He passed away last November at the age of just 3 months from a very rare neurolgical condition, Ponto-Cerebellar Hypoplasia Type 1. Nicola and Stephen set up the Joshua Deeth Foundation in his memory to raise money to fund research and help ...
Fri 9th
15:40
Lib Dems' Moore praises Gove apology as schools building programme axe triggers coalition tensions
The blunder in the education department which led to the publication of a list of axed school building schemes containing 25 errors continues to rumble on. Conservative education secretary Michael Gove has apologised and taken the rap for his officials' mistakes. The Lib Dems' Michael Moore was sympathetic to Mr Gove's plight on the BBC's Question Time last night, commending the quick and full apology: I think he did that with grace. I think he did it appropriately and he's determined that that doesn't happen again. Nobody would wish that had happened. It was a major mistake, it has been ...
News that Cragside House in Northumberland has been closed as part of the hunt for the elusive Raoul Moat is a good excuse for watching this Jonathan Meades programme again.
Andrew Stunnell turned up to the LGA with the rest of the local government ministerial team. Amongst other places Andrew spoke to the Lib Dem group meeting and the Annual meal where, as you would expect, he was well received. It was interesting that although few doubted the way ahead was going to be rough the number who thought we had made the wrong call was incredibly small. Many of us have been in this for the long haul and have always known that this was a stage which we had to pass through. The route to survival and is ...
This was, apparently, the first debate on this subject in the Lords for four years, sought by Baroness Ford from the Labour benches. Ros was called upon to summate from the Liberal Democrat benches... Baroness Scott of Needham Market: My Lords, this afternoon's debate has been about housing. Many television programmes, which millions of people enjoy, talk about property. However, as the noble Baronesses, Lady Ford and Lady Wilkins, reminded us, we are talking about people's homes-the places that should form the secure base from which we all lead our lives, and most of us are lucky enough to do ...
A new poll just commissioned by Lib Dems for Drug Policy Reform and conducted by Vision Critical shows that 70% of people are in favour of cannabis being legalised. It also shows that more people are in favour of legalising Amphetamines (speed), Magic Mushrooms and Mephedrone (the drug recently banned by the government) than are in favour of keeping them prohibited. For ecstasy there is still a small majority in favour of prohibition (54%) but 39% are in favour of legalisation in some form. Even heroin and cocaine have around a third of people who want to see them legalised. ...
My House Points column from today's Liberal Democrat News. I wanted to say something about the way that Labour talks all the time about "child poverty" and defines it as living in a household with less than 60 per cent of median income. In doing so they are dodging or disguising the debate about equality that we should be having. And they are sentimentalising the issue. Whatever definition of poverty we accept, it is not children who are poor but their parents. But the space ran out. Hodgson inanities It's worth paying Sharon Hodgson some attention, and not just because ...
Lord Lester's Defamation Bill received its Second Reading in the House of Lords today, footage of which is available in full on the Parliament TV channel.In an encouraging development, Lord Tom McNally announced that the government is to give priority to the reform of English and Welsh libel law by bringing forward a Libel Reform Bill in the 2011/2012 Parliamentary session following consultation
Fri 9th
14:20Hackney Council under fire over allegations it misled public about who was standing in election
The excellent Jack of Kent legal blog has the full details of the brewing story in Hackney, where the council had already been accused of wrongly excluding the manifesto of the Conservative Party's Mayor candidate, Andrew Boff, from the booklet sent to the public. (The Mayoral elections in Hackney have similar rules to those for Mayor of London, whereby all candidates submit artwork which is then collected in a booklet and sent out to all electors.) In addition, Hackney Council is now accused of repeatedly misinforming members of the public, telling them that in fact not only was there no ...
From Mark Hunter: [IMG: Mark Hunter, Paul Burstow and Jayne Bessant] Yesterday, Thursday 9th July, Care Services Minister and Lib Dem colleague Paul Burstow joined Cheadle MP Mark Hunter on a special visit to St Ann's Hospice in Heald Green. On the day that a top level announcement was made about a review into care funding, the Minister was introduced to the new Chief Executive, Jayne Bessant, and toured the outstanding facilities of the well known, reputable Hospice. Mr Burstow and Mr Hunter toured the facilities to view the exceptional work that is carried out at St Ann's, and met ...
It's that time of the week when the #followfriday rules of norm are abandoned in favour of a much more agreeable way of recommending tweeps and blogs to the masses. Yes folk's it's time for 'Spidey's Web'. Have you been caught in Spidey's web this week? Top 10 tweeters Noeticat - An honourable LibDem and ...
Today the Treasury's Spending Challenge website, which asks for ideas on how to save public money, has been opened up to the public. Last month it was launched to those who work in the public sector but now everyone is being invited to contribute. This two-stage launch was a smart move as it helped deal with the issue of quality of submissions that often plagues such online initiatives. By first getting in views of those who work in the public service, the Spending Challenge website has managed to keep to a minimum the number of electronic equivalents of ideas written ...
Anyone would have thought that Mr Gove was the first Secretary of State to have taken an axe to school building programmes. In the great devaluation crisis that played out during the final months of 1967 and early 1968, school building was savaged just as now, along with the raising of the school leaving age from 15 to 16. Here is what Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, said to the House of Commons on the 16th January 1968: 31. Education. Next education, one of the biggest and most rapidly expanding expenditure programmes. Total expenditure is estimated this year at £1,989 million, ...
Last week Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg set up the Your Freedom website, inviting people to give their ideas to restore and improve freedom for individuals and businesses. As he says: We're working to create a more open and less intrusive society through our Programme for Government. We want to restore Britain's traditions of freedom and fairness, and free our society of unnecessary laws and regulations - both for individuals and businesses. This site gives you the chance to tell us which laws and regulations you think we should get rid of. Your feedback will inform government policy and some ...
To Ed Miliband's Campaign Team I am somewhat concerned regarding Ed Miliband's commitment to equality after reading his interview with Liberal Conspiracy. I'll quote for your convenience: "2. Would you allow gays to be legally married, rather than just be registered as a civil partnership? He hesitates. "I will listen to what people have to say on going further than that if there is a demand. No one has yet put that to me in the leadership election." He said his feeling was that not enough people were asking for the policy." This statement seems illogical. The reason there is ...
Former Chair of the Social Liberal Forum Richard Grayson writes: Check out an e-pamphlet I have written called The Liberal Democrat Journey to a Lib-Con Coalition – and Where Next? which is published today by Compass. A shorter version of it is published in the New Statesman available from newstands in London today and everywhere else in the UK from tomorrow. The full pamphlet can be found on the Compass website.
[IMG: jdw_2010-07-01_14-19-52_194] (something has gone awry with the links behind the top level images on the blog. Will be fixed later today.) A friend of mine won tickets to the Goodwood Festival of Speed, a car event. Yes, environment fans, it was everything you would expect. The oddest moment of the day was talking to young women in the military - by young I mean without the uniform I would have asked one of them for ID before serving them in a pub - who were telling tales of getting shot at in Afghanistan. Now there's something to bring a ...
Great fanfare has been made of 'Paul the octopus' and how he has accurately predicted that Spain would beat Germany in the football World Cup and that in the final Spain would beat Holland. In a Spiderplant Land exclusive, I can now reveal why Paul the octopus is talking utter garbage and why Holland will ...
It's worth reading this excellent and passionate article by the Bishop of Croydon (in the Diocese of Southwark) on Cif Belief in the Guardian: So, the Dean of St Albans has been "blocked" from becoming the next Bishop of Southwark. Really? Well, the Telegraph has confidently told us so - so we might as well remove our brains and take their word for it. Or not. ...If a particular candidate does not emerge as the one to be nominated, it is probably because on balance they are not thought to be the person who best fulfils what the diocese said ...
As well as the five that I've posted about so far (Yellow Sticky Notes, The Pearce Sisters, Pigeon Impossible, El Empleo and John and Karen) there were five others at the event which I haven't managed to find online. Fog (if I recall correctly) was an odd story about a mountain village being revived by capturing sheep that fly in the sky. The exploitation of the sheep brings affluence to the village, but then the sheep depart leaving the village depressed again. I can't recall the title of the film about a daughter who waited for her father to return ...
Huge media coverage of a funeral led to the son of the deceased man to complain that the spreading of detailed information about the funeral was "formerly unheard of - and is an outrage". I refer, of course, to the son of the Duke of Wellington speaking in 1852; a handy reminder that questions of new media intruding into previously private information is not such a new question.
On @trevornunn boat in the Blackwater helping to get it ready for the big sail tonight
With the Labour party claiming an influx of new recruits, Lib Dem parliamentary candidate for Reading East at the last election, Gareth Epps, has written to The Guardian pointing out the Lib Dems too have seen a significant increase in new members: Your report (7 July) of a "surge" in Labour membership makes claims about recruits from the Liberal Democrats. Labour's claims are Walter Mittyish. My local Lib Dem party has had its most sustained membership boost since the 1988 merger. Since the election, we have had 10 members joining for each departure. As Labour's crocodile tears continue over cuts ...
There have been a high number of bar robberies in Chorlton over the last fortnight. I had met with Chief Supt Potts last Friday and stressed the need for an increased presence, which came, but hasn't stopped bars being robbed. In the last fortnight, Iguana, Charango, Hilary Step & The Bar have all suffered from robberies. The Trevor was burgled too. Rest assured that I will do everything I can to stop this, in conjunction with the Police.
Steve Webb will be opening the newly rebuilt play area on Saturday 17 July. There's lots of new equipment, and local children have already been making good use of most of it. The event runs from 11 am until 1pm, and there will be face painting, fun multi-sports activities, balloons and refreshments. This is a joint South Glos and Dodington Parish Council project.
Pam and I are looking closely at a number of areas in Cheadle & Gatley that need a bit more than just the odd patch or two. As always, money's the main issue. There are two or three places we can get money from, but they're all limited. For example, there's an area of worn tarmac on Old Hall Road (near the junction with Pendlebury Road, just north of the grass triangle). Patching up the individual potholes won't do much good - the patches will wear away in no time. It needs to be properly resurfaced. Resurfacing that section of ...
Yesterday was a good day for civil liberties. Theresa May came to the Commons to make a statement in response to a decision by the European Court of Human rights that judged that the use of stop and search powers under section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000 amounted to a violation of the right to a private life. Section 44 was already going to be dealt with - so it was a decision welcomed by the coalition government. Alan Johnson, (Labour ex-Home Secretary) said he was shocked that this Home Secretary was not going to appeal the decision. He ...
In yet another move that underlines the coalition government's desire to reverse the illiberal aspects of the last Labour Government, the Home Secretary Theresa May has announced that new restrictions are being placed on a controversial police power used to stop and search people. The BBC say that the police will now not be allowed to use the power unless they "reasonably suspect" a person of being a terrorist. This follows a European Court of Human Rights ruling last month that the power to search people without suspicion under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000 was illegal. As if ...
Fri 9th
10:20Worth a second outing: What's the point of switching to individual electoral registration?
Welcome to a series where old posts are revived for a second outing for reasons such as their subject has become topical again, they have aged well but were first posted when the site's readership was only a tenth or less of what it is currently or they got published and the site crashed, hiding the finest words of wisdom behind an incomprehensible error message. This one is from Spring last year and has been slightly updated. After a long period of stalling, the Labour Government finally announced in spring 2009 a timetable for switching Britain's electoral registration system from ...
Last night I was privilaged to have been invited to the official opening of Prestwich Arts College's new theatre - The Paragon. The theatre is part of the redeveloped Bracewell Hall - a conventional school hall - but now meets the modern needs of a an Arts college that embraces the performing arts, creative and media studies. The Paragon theatre but on a spectacular show in the presence of the Mayor and Mayoress of Bury and what a show it was. Starting with their newly formed Junior Theatre Company, the dance crew, and many others including a Jazz group from ...
Waitrose have applied for planning permission for the proposed supermarket and 190 homes at the Barnhill site in Chipping Sodbury, the site behind St John's Church that runs from the car park into the old quarry area. Details should be available shortly, but they're not on South Glos Council's planning applications website yet. Waitrose say that the supermarket will be generating up to 160 jobs. If permission is given by South Glos, building would be likely to start in the autumn of 2011. The first phase of the scheme, including the supermarket, could then be completed in 2012. There has ...
It was London LGBT Pride last weekend, which got me and some friends talking about gay equality in the pub earlier this week. I suggested, controversially it seems, that Brian Dowling and Big Brother did far more for gays in the UK than most.
It is now a year since the start of the European Parliament's current (2009-14) mandate; this week it was felt in two ways. First, MEPs - over half of whom are new - looked and sounded exhausted during the final plenary session before the summer break. Second, this week's votes were of considerable importance. On Tuesday we voted to update legislation on novel foods, reiterating our opposition to meat or dairy products from cloned animals and calling for a moratorium on foods produced using nano-technology. We also voted to extend rights enjoyed by airline passengers to passengers in ship, rail ...
Anyone who wishes to look at what would happen with Labour's financial strategy need look no further than Greece. They have had to implement greater and greater cuts in an attempt to bring their finances under control.Looking at bond yields today:Country Debt interest rateGermany 10 year 2.64%Greece 10 year 10.447%Ireland 10 year 5.268%UK 10 year 3.373%This shows how greece is
A few weeks ago I fell off a wall during what has become known as "The Great Focus Leaflet Delivery Tragedy of 2010." I was trying to take a shortcut between two houses whilst out delivering Focus, and managed to sprain both my ankles and, worse, my achilles. I couldn't drive for a while, walked with a limp for a fortnight, and still can't run or put much pressure on my feet. All of which has made it much easier for me to pretend that I would've been doing a massive pre-wedding fitness regime were it not for my injuries. ...
I have written before about the impact on Liberalism made by Kropotkin.(sadly I have not tagged all the postings). Nevertheless I was unaware about a visit made to Kropotkin's grave by leading YL's back in the winter of 1967/8. Writing in the most recent Journal of Liberal History (Issue 67) Peter Hellyer records a visit to Russia : Our hosts were somewhat taken aback by our requests and questions.Thus in Moscow, we insisted on visiting the tomb of the Russian anarchist Peter Kropotkin, in Kiev we asked party officials to explain the nature of Ukraine's separate national identity, and in ...
The enthusiastic volunteers of Sodbury in Bloom have been sprucing up the town ready for the judges' visit on Monday. From baskets and planters in the High Street to Lilliput Park and the Millennium Garden, it's all been very busy. Major thanks are due to all the individuals and groups for their hard work. There's a final Sodbury in Bloom Action Party this Sunday at 10.30am, meeting at the Community compost site, Shire Way, Yate - take your trowel and a busy lizzie! Sodbury in Bloom can be contacted via their web page.
New East Manchester are working to try to ensure that as many local people as possible get jobs in the new Morrisons store in Openshaw, following their successful recruitment of local people for Tesco in Gorton. Apart from a few specialised jobs, people will be recruited through two Open Day events. Anyone interested must ring the hotline number 0161 251 3432 from Monday 19th July - lines open from 9.30am - 4.30pm. People will then be allocate a slot at one of the open days where they will be given more information on Morrisons as an employer and the vacancies ...
It's Friday, so here's a fistful of lists that sum up the past week on LDV: 5 most-read stories on LDV this week 1. Opinion: I admit it, I am shocked by Labour's hatred (243) by Nick Perry 2. Would the coalition dare to cut welfare back to Labour levels? (18) by Iain Roberts 3. EXCLUSIVE: What Lib Dem members think of the Coalition Budget measures and that VAT increase (61) by Stephen Tall 4. The coalition "marriage" - should we keep our name? (58) by Helen Duffett 5. Should our MPs give Clegg more support in the Commons? (34) ...
@simond Hope that means you're doing what I think you're doing [IMG: :)] in reply to simond # I just ousted @jennykearney as the mayor of Priory Park on @foursquare! http://4sq.com/8ZrXJY # @helenduffett Don't forget to count meter cupboards so you can spot tbe flat doors round the back [IMG: :)] in reply to helenduffett # The campaign for vote reform now needs a simple message | Liberal Conspiracy - http://bit.ly/cedID6 # @willhowells Latest show was much more you than me [IMG: :)] in reply to willhowells # Attempting to triumph over TfL en route to helping in Barking by-election ...
I love Spain. I particularly love Mallorca where I've spent 13 holidays in the last 20 years. It's a beautiful, friendly island with gorgeous beaches, stunning mountain scenery. Even after all this time we find out something new we like about it every single time we go there. We also have a growing list of things we have to sample every time - horchata de almendra, the liquid marzipan milkshake traditional to Valldemossa, the delicious home made ice cream in Soller - the orange flavour is a thing of pure heaven, the rich hot chocolate you can almost stand a ...
Lib Dem Voice has polled our members-only forum to discover what Lib Dem members think of the Coalition Government's budget, and what you make of the Lib Dems' and Government's performance to date. Over 350 party members have responded, and we've been publishing the full results of our survey this week. Today, in the final part of our survey, we focus on the performances of the leading lights of the Liberal Democrats – those of our MPs in the cabinet, those occupying ministerial positions, and other leading Lib Dems. LDV asked: How would you rate the performances of the following ...
In both London and in Tallinn the good summer weather is making bloggers - including this one- rather lazy. Iain Dale is taking a 10 day break, and activity across the blogosphere is declining in the summer heat. In part this reflects the simple exhaustion after the election campaign and the long phony war that preceded it. It also reflects, I think, a new evolution in the way blogs are being written. The advent of Twitter has reduced a blog to a tweet, and the significant amount of work that a blog involves is also causing even long standing and ...
i) births and deaths 9 July 2007: Death of Peter Tuddenham, who was the voice of the computer in Ark in Space, the voice of the Mandragora Helix in The Masque of Mandragora, and the voice of the Brain in Time and the Rani. Blake's 7 fans remember him also as Orac, Zen and Slave. ii) broadcast anniversaries 9 July 1966: broadcast of the third episode of The War Machines, which starts with Ben dodging away from the machine confronting him last week; he works out that Polly is under the control of WOTAN, and the episode ends with a ...
I am not entirely sure that the Tory backbench revolt is aware that there are two sides to every bargain. If they decide to pursue paths to scupper reform and vote against the holding of a referendum on voting reform (AV at least) then it will also hold that backbench Lib Dems are well placed to walk away from the proposal to reduce the number of constituencies by 50 and equalize the number of constituents each holds across the UK (apart from those where the statutory geographic area is at its max; say in the Scottish Highlands). It is not ...
Reaction to Michael Gove's announcement that the coalition is to abandon over 700 school building projects first centred on the pupils and teachers who will continue to work in sub-standard conditions. It then switched to anger from the users of the 25 or so schools which were not on the list, so thought they had escaped the axe, only to discover that they had been left off by mistake. One really does wonder about the competence of civil servants who can't even put together an accurate list. What has happened to these "mandarins" who used to have the reputation of ...
It would seem that the Anglican Church is set to have another debate about whether to catch up with other denominations, except the Holy See in Rome, and lift the glass ceiling. For 16 years now women have been allowed to be parish priests but with no hope of progress on the career ladder within the church. In the same time there have been female Moderators of the Church of Scotland and leaders of the Methodists. Yet there seems no certain move for the Anglican Church because of the threat of the Anglo-Catholics either removing themselves or their wealth from ...
Fri 9th
01:39
Government policy further to the abolition of regional spatial strategies - technical note
Readers interested in the technical consequences of the abolition of regional spatial strategies should read the following:
peterbirks: Hours You Won't Get Back "I have two children. One is a boy born on a Tuesday. What is the probability I have two boys?" Pete Birks provides the first convincing explanation I have seen as to why the correct answer is 13/27 and not 1/3. (tags: mathematics) From <lj user="diggerdydum"> Daleks in your home! (tags: doctorwho)
Those waiting for PEP! 2, I should have proof PDFs for the authors in about a week, and it'll be available soon after. I've been monstrously busy...
I'm a couple of weeks late with my review of this one, so most of what there is to be said about it has been said elsewhere by other people. But there are a couple of things that I don't *think* anyone else has touched upon. A couple of years ago, on his register-to-read, only-posted-to-twice ...
One of the most important books for left liberals in recent years has been the "The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better". It's important for number of reasons, however the main one is that it appears to provide an empirical basis to justify policies that redistribute income for no purpose other than redistribution. In some Liberal Democrat and Labour circles it has been treated with a sense of uncritical reverence usually reserved for religious tracts. This is not entirely without reason, it is a good read, and the weight of statistical evidence, both comparisons between countries ...
About four years ago I was part of a team that carried out a survey on Broadway's speed limit in Morecambe. It is 40mph but we wanted to know if it should be lowered as it is a broad way and there are drivers who treat it like a racetrack. In summary we supported a lowering of the limit. There have been a couple of accidents this year, one of which closed the road for a few hours and caused a lamppost to be replaced. The light is now working properly but the light was on during daylight hours for ...
