Seriously, 5 days after Bart and I wrote about it, her people have issued a statement saying 'Dragon Tattoo' Rumor Is 'Absolutely False'. This is because The Sun and Metro.co.uk ran it as a story yesterday Tabloids, not only do they get the stories completely wrong, they get the stories wrong 5 days later than a pair of bloggers...
I wrote about how good so much is at Preston Hall Museum on Saturday, but also some issues. One of the problems was about the "dressing up" clothes. I am very impressed indeed at the very quick action and reply to this, and post it below - must pay a visit and have a try on of the new set of clothes I'll be in Preston Park tomorrow, but for the Tristar Funday, manning the Fairtrade stall. ...
Recently, there has been much speculation around Nick Bostrom's paper, "Are You Living In A Comic Book?", which argued that given how easily comic books can be created, and the number of characters that appear in them, it is more likely that any given individual is a character in a comic book rather than a ...
BBC Wales reports that the legal cost of the Welsh Assembly Government's defence of its planned badger cull was more than £57,000. However, they also continue to cling to the lazy and entirely inaccurate myth that the Government only lost the case on a technicality, namely that they failed to properly reflect the consultation in the way the order was drawn up. In fact the most damaging grounds for rejection of the Minister's case was that she had failed to demonstrate the substantial reduction in bTB necessary to justify culling a protected species. She was only able to claim a ...
I've got proper coding work to do, but my brain isn't working straight, so I've been hacking my layout again. Almost certainly Dreamwidth specific as they only work because the Devs put a lot of effort into Classes for CSS tricks within the base code. Two little tricks, both done through the Customize Journal Style CSS page, dead easy. Custom comment coloursFirst is to give a regular commenter a custom colour in the comments box. Can only be done for logged in DW users, unfortunately, an OpenID user has .s in their name and that breaks CSS, might get that ...
I've recently watched the film Whistle down the wind and was a bit taken aback. The first 30-40mins are superb. It is a wonderful portrayal of childhood innocence. The children are spontaneous and funny, but the film thesis is problematic. It is the story of two children finding a man in their barn and believe it's Jesus. The innocent and naïve faith of the children is contrasted with the world
This evening, along with two office bearers from the Community Spirit Action Group and my ward colleague Cllr Donald Hay, I met with Lawrence Davie, Managing Director of National Express Dundee. The Community Spirit representatives handed over the petition about the 11/12 service - with some 650 signatures from local residents. It was a very positive and constructive meeting. It is clear that National Express Dundee is listening to local concerns and Lawrence hopes to announce positive changes to the service once he has Board approval and agreement from the Traffic Commissioner. This should hopefully allow longer weekday services and ...
This afternoon, I had the pleasure of addressing the Dundee Blind and Partially Sighted Society Ladies' Club on the challenges facing the City Council and some key projects. The club meets every Wednesday at the society's premises in Ward Road - and it was a real pleasure to meet the members, who gave me a very warm welcome.
The seven Baha'i leaders who had been detained in Tehran's fearsome Evin prison for 20 months without charge have finally been sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment after they were finally accused of espionage, propaganda against the Islamic order and establishment of an illegal administration. These convictions were handed down after the defendants were allowed one hour's consultation with their lawyer, and after several brief court appearances in which no evidence was presented on any of the charges. The facts are at news.bahai.org/story/786, and the reaction of Human Rights Watch is at www.hrw.org/en/news/2010/08/10/iran-free-bahai-leaders. Lets hope there will be demands for the ...
While I've been thinking holiday thoughts, others have been producing some fantastic writing. It'll take a few editions to get through the best of the last couple of weeks: First up tonight, Joan McAlpine asks why Naomi Campbell is getting all the media disapproval while the actual mass murdering megalomaniac on trial is being virtually ignored. Stephen subjects his "friends" in the American Families Association to a right old fisking in the light of the Proposition 8 Judgement. Two for the price of one here as the lovely elephant writes about the stigmatisation benefit claimants and links to Jennie's article, ...
Good news – not only will this blog stay online (after considerable thought) but with a desire to refocus and do something new, I have a new site which will be available in a couple of days time blog.londonliberal.org.uk Not too much point in clicking on it yet, as the domain is in process of ...
Good news the meeting has asked the cabinet to re-consider. The bad news it is the same cabinet that considered the decision in the first place.
Wed 11th
19:35
Edinburgh to London 30 minutes by train - is China leading the way on public transport?
We're used to some of our European neighbours, along with Japan, being ahead of the game on public transport, whilst car is undoubted king in the US and the UK struggles along as usual. But there are signs China could leapfrog into the lead with some impressive plans. Chinese scientists are working on a Maglev train the runs through airless tunnels (so no drag) at speeds of up to 1000 kph (over 600 mph) which could get you from Edinburgh to London in a little over half an hour, or Manchester to London in under twenty minutes. For local transport ...
Monday I saw the consultant at Dulwich who deals with osteoporosis. She reviewed the medication I'm taking, and prescribed bendroflumethiazide for fluctuating blood pressure (which I had been taking before the operation, but was replaced by a beta blocker in King's). Systolic had varied between 91 and 187 in the previous few days, and so far the spread since resuming the bendro etc has been 110 and 164. Unfortunately one of the known side effects is that its a diuretic, and I already have a problem having to get up several times during the night. Monday evening we took JW ...
I've gone for a seasonal poem as the latest addition to my anthology. Over the past few days it's been a bit wet - although now the weather has turned nice again, at least here in Bristol - this doesn't seem quite so appropriate as it did. You can't win them all, though... Dark August by Derek Walcott So much rain, so much life like the swollen sky of this black August. My sister, the sun, broods in her yellow room and won't come out. Everything goes to hell; the mountains fume like a kettle, rivers overrun; still, she will ...
I've just got back from a very enjoyable 3 hour "tour of Didsbury", while the Britain in Bloom judges visited numerous parts of the town to assess us for the award. Starting outside the Slug and Lettuce I met the 2 judges from the Royal Horticultural Society and we made our way from the Library, ...
Action movie? Rom-com? Complete shambles? Knight and Day tries to be both of the first two but ends up the third. It's the film that Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz were promoting when they appeared on Top Gear a couple of weeks ago. Even Clarkson's cringeworthy faux flirting was more entertaining than the movie itself. Knight and Day had a 'troubled' production. Cruise was apparently the fifth choice to play the male lead (how the mighty have fallen) and Diaz the second choice to play opposite. The script went through a dozen writers - and boy does it show. There's ...
David Cameron's recent comments on council housing tenancies have sparked some controversy in the media and here on Lib Dem Voice. First, I am delighted that at least there is a debate around housing policy. Many people are simply unable to afford to buy, leaving people in cramped overcrowded accommodation that is harmful to their and their family's health. There are still many people sleeping on our streets and many more in homeless shelters and temporary accommodation. I've seen both ends of the crisis. Ten years ago I was homeless myself and went through the shelters to temporary accommodation until ...
Here in the UK we may feel that we are unaffected by the Russian heatwave and the Pakistani floods. The reality however is that we will be very much affected. We have got used to relatively cheap food supplies from all over the planet. Western countries have been at the top of the global market food chain and we have got rather used to it. But times are changing and the events in Russia and
This Thursday, at 10am, the Government's Spending Challenge website (click HERE) will close to new suggestions. These will feed into the Spending Review. So, if you have some fabulous idea for cutting costs, get yourself over there right now. I've done my bit. My inspiration came from the challenge made today by the coalition parties to the ex-ministers standing for the Labour leadership. The Milibands, Ed Balls and Andy Burnham have all been challenged to return the £20,000 severance payments to which they had been entitled as outgoing ministers. All told, the men and women leaving ministerial office after Labour's ...
Wed 11th
16:56
Citizens Advice urge acceptance of plans for holistic tax, tax credit and benefit reform
Plans by Works and Pension Secretary, Iain Duncan Smith to overhaul the benefits system have received the endorsement of the Citizens Advice Bureau. Their Director of Policy, Teresa Perchard argues that a large part of the amount quoted by the Goverment as being lost through fraud is actually due to error arising from the complexity of the system: "Citizens Advice acknowledges that the £1.5bn cost of fraud in the benefit system must be recovered, but we are very concerned at the government's persistent tendency to roll fraud and error figures together. Errors account for the remaining £3.7bn of the £5.2bn ...
Chris Huhne has called on councils to kick-start a local power revolution As part of his ambitious plans to create a sustainable low-carbon economy, the Liberal Democrat Energy and Climate Change Secretary has written to all local authorities to announce that from next week they will be allowed to sell renewable electricity to the grid. At present only 0.01% of electricity in England is generated by local authority-owned renewables, despite the scope that exists to install projects on their land and buildings. In Germany the equivalent figure is 100 times higher. At present local authorities are able to put any ...
Saddened to hear that David Cameron has announced that private credit rating companies will be paid for bounty hunting benefits fraudsters. Completely agree that the estimated £1.5billion pa benefits fraud has to be curtailed. But saddened that no mention of the estimated £15billion pa of tax fraud as per National Fraud Authority. Where's the sense of proportion. Both should be fixed but frankly tax evasion is 10 times the size of problem and should be the priority. As a law abiding tax payer I want both fixed so that those on genuine benefits can be sure it's fair and safe ...
So the Coalition have announced the end of the Playbuilder scheme, scrapping or scaling back hundreds of community playground projects. The exact direct savings to the public purse are unclear. The scheme's overall budget was £235 million to fund 3,500 projects. According to the BBC less than 1,300 have been completed so a rough guess ...
One of the many great things about our party is its steadfast refusal to bow to media pressure. Take, as Exhibit A, the sweet joy of being a conference rep and voting down the leadership's preferred policy option. We don't care that it will be portrayed by the next day's newspapers, as erroneous as it is inevitable, as a party split. We are also a truly radical party. Most policies taken for granted today entered the pages of our policy documents long before Labour or the Conservatives sheepishly followed. Come next month I hope that gay marriage will be the ...
Farewell, then, to Jimmy Reid, possibly the last British trade unionist to really stick it to The Man and come out on top, and in the course of his "work-in" at the Upper Clyde Shipyards in 1971 he did just that without having to resort to rhetoric or useless waving of placards. A man of deeds as well as words, and latterly a fierce critic - for all the right reasons - of what has become of his once beloved Labour Party, he'll be sorely missed. The last vestige of the proud Red Clydeside tradition is gone. In his later ...
Today's unemployment figures continue to make depressing reading for those of us living in Scotland. It's worrying to see the trend of the last year or so continuing with Scotland's unemployment rising while it's falling in the UK overall. 34,000 more people are unemployed this year than in the same period last year. Those figures don't even include me because I'm not claiming benefit or looking for another job, as I'm fortunate enough to be able to stay at home with my daughter and my blog for a while. The Holyrood and Westminster Governments are going to have to manage ...
Some more details of the Lib Dem Pupil Premium are coming out. It means from September 2011 that schools that take disadvantages kids will get additional money they need to provide extra support that such kids need. It also means with this extra support such kids wont be holding back other kids from progressing. Win win all round. The headteachers will decide how to us this money - potentially 121 tuition, catch-up classes, whatever the head things best. What I hadn' realised was that this was one of the key sticking points when the Lib Dems were negotiating with Labour ...
Following the success of yesterday's blog post about the bits of Sky that Rupert Murdoch doesn't own I thought I'd better turn attention to the name of the man himself. 10. Murdoch is a large, strong orange tender engine and the largest steam engine on the lsland at least in the TV adaptation of Reverend W. V. Awdry. 's Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends 9. Junior Officers in the British Army are nicknamed Rupert apparently because they epitomise the public school values as in Rupert the Bear (see below) 8. 9138_Murdoch an asteroid in asteroid belt. 7. The paradummies ...
I, along with a significant number of local councillors are becoming increasingly dismayed at the seemingly endless round of weakening of democracy and over centralisation of power at Bury town hall. For those that don't know Bury has 51 Councillors, no one party has overall control - the Conservatives are the largest party. Yet Bury is effectively run by 5 Conservative councillors with barely any input, checks and balances and very basic scrutiny of decisions and policies. I am increasingly of the opinion that there is no point in attending meetings at the Town Hall, my time would be more ...
Wed 11th
14:32
Miss SB's Very Prestigious and Entirely Serious Blog Awards - Category Seven: Best Beardy Blogger
[IMG: [livejournal.com profile] ] burkesworks Councillor the Honourable Lady Mark Valladares Currybet [IMG: [personal profile] ] matgb Mike Szymanski [IMG: [livejournal.com profile] ] redhillian Please take a look at them, assess them, and then vote. The vote is anonymous, and you don't have to have a Dreamwidth account to vote - instructions on logging in with open ID are here. Do feel free to pimp it out to your readers if you've been nominated. The poll will remain open for a week, and the next category will go up tomorrow. View Poll: Best Beardy Blogger Other Categories: Best Political Blog ...
Last week LDV ran an article from Sara Bedford asking whether prayers should be a part of council meetings. The issue of compelling people to engage in religious worship is not just confined to Parliament or some of our more old fashioned council chambers, but affects a significant proportion of our population. Unbeknown to many, all state maintained schools in England and Wales are legally required to provide their pupils with daily Collective Worship. In faith schools the worship is supposed to be provided in accordance with the school's designated religion or religious denomination, while in all other schools the ...
H/t to Kevin Carson writing at the Centre for a Stateless Society yesterday for binging this to my attention. Way back I wrote about how whether our futures are free or totalitarian will likely be down to the fiendishly clever folks who hack away at systems, finding a ay through a firewall here, a method of covering our tracks there. There are lots of potential internet based technologies that could lock the state out of our private lives, preventing them seeing what we are looking at, finding out how much money we have or are making or spending and so ...
Kew Gardens has moved to Cornwall. At least that's the impression given by the Visit Cornwall tourism website. The website is the main tool used by the Council funded Cornwall Development Company to market Cornwall and to attract visitors. Not surprisingly, there's a map with text that says: Don't forget nearly 95% of Cornwall is now on Google Street View too. If you click on that link, you are re-directed to Google Street View. So which Cornish location does it alight on? The Eden Project? St Michael's Mount? Launceston Castle? None of these, but that well known Cornish attraction Kew ...
Lib Dem climate change and energy secretary Chris Huhne joined with Conservative party chair Baroness Sayeedi Warsi today to launch a blistering attack on Labour's financial legacy. You can read Chris's speech in full, below, in which he issues a stark challenge to Labour to "face up to the challenge of fixing our nation's finances", warning that if they don't "they won't deserve power for another generation." However, it is Baroness Warsi's demand to David and Ed Miliband, Ed Balls and Andy Burnham to forfeit their £20,000 severance pay as cabinet ministers – branded their "reward for failure" – which ...
The ten Greater Manchester authorities, including Stockport, are being urged to introduce a minimum per-unit price for alcohol across the area. The move, planned for October, would see a standard bottle of wine costing at least £4.50, a 700ml bottle of whisky £14 and a six pack of lager at least £6. Stockport Council has come out against the plans, for the simple reason that the council doesn't think it makes sense to do it on a Greater Manchester basis rather than nationwide. I have to say I agree. There's a case for minimum alcohol pricing, but if implemented, this ...
The following rather reminds me of how many people say they feel about the volume of information online, save that it's from a novel first published in 1935: He would prowl the stacks of the library at night, pulling books out of a thousand shelves and reading them like a madman. The thought of these vast stacks of books would drive him mad: the more he read, the less he seemed to know - the greater the number of books he read, the greater the immense uncountable number of those which he could never read would seem to be. It's ...
I'm sure everyone is gripped by the news that later on today the BNP will announce if any of their members have reached the criteria to ensure a leadership election. Apparently, three people want to challenge Nick Griffin, but the process is so arcane, and so confusing, that the hopeful candidates don't even know themselves ...
The latest edition of the Journal of Direct, Data and Digital Marketing Practice (Volume 12, Number 1) has a piece from me titled, "Obama: The marketing lessons". The piece itself isn't available to read for free online, but here's the abstract: Barack Obama's double campaign for the democrat nomination and then for the Presidency presented numerous opportunities for improved marketing based on savvy use of technology. Integrating data, using the internet (particularly social media), exploiting text messaging, embracing interactive methods of communication and building on technology already developed for others all combined to give Obama's campaign a boost. But the ...
The BNP are having one of their, now seemingly regular, purges of disloyal party members. Nick Griffin and his clique are becoming increasingly isolated within a movement that seems intent on tearing itself apart. Kirklees Unity have published the list of the latest batch of members who have fallen out of favour with Nick Griffin,
The BBC website reports that Sion Jenkins, who was convicted, in 1998 of the murder of his stepdaughter, but later acquitted after two successive retrial juries failed to reach a verdict, has been refused compensation. I can't profess to any knowledge of the legalities of this, but morally it seems a highly questionable decision. Surely if his conviction has been overturned then he ought to be regarded in the eyes of the law as as innocent of the crime. Before his arrest he enjoyed a successful professional career (he had just been appointed head teacher of a secondary school) and ...
It is noticeable that, whilst young Mr Clegg has come under fire for some of the things he has said, most of the policy glitches have come from Conservative-inspired ideas. Nick's so-called gaffes on child detention and Iraq merely underlined our world view as Liberal Democrats, and revealed that he hasn't yet been captured by the moderate(ish) Conservatives we are currently working with. Whilst the media, who hate us anyway, will snipe away, he'll be the better for it. I am less sanguine about some of the policy initiatives coming from the Conservative side of the coalition. It isn't that ...
After being upstaged by Lord Mandelson, Tony Blair's book is getting a massive plug. He's even recorded a nice little video message: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/mpd/permalink/m24ATQ4STKI0M5 Anyway, Blair's book is out soon and love him or loath him it should be an interesting read.
Congratulations this week to the Tyacks Hotel, on Commercial Street, which has been nominated as Pub of the Year in the Great British Pub awards. Tyacks has provided part- and full-time employment for many Camborne people over the years, including myself when I was a student and then later after my graduation. The current manager, Jodie, does a great job leading her team. She is one of the youngest tenanted managers I know in the county, certainly to be running such a large turnover establishment. This makes the nomination even more of an achievement! The awards ceremony will be held ...
South Gloucestershire Council are updating their housing strategy and would like to know what your thoughts are on the "Next steps in delivering More Housing, More Choice-Affordable, Sustainable and Better Quality". You can find out more on their website. The deadline for comments is 30th August 2010.
As reported yesterday in the Independent 'Rupert Murdoch claims to own the 'Sky' in 'Skype'' Skype (the free to use international internet video link service) has noted in its application to the Nasdaq stock exchange that "in respect of the Skype name are being opposed by BSkyB plc". Shame that will not help them achive the price they may have been hoping for. Rupert Murdoch must be quite concerned about Skype. He is not a fan of free to use services. In honour of what Sky does not yet own with the word Sky in it Stephen Glenn lists 'Ten ...
I have just come across the "emerging evidence" from British Election Study (BES) for the 2010 general election. The findings confirm two of my earlier conclusions, based on the Ipsos MORI election data: that Liberal Democrat support grew during the campaign but remained soft; and whilst Nick Clegg's personal support shot up after the first debate, support for the Lib Dems did not firm up as a result. As the BES summary and conclusions slide puts it: With weak fundamentals, ineffective campaigns and widespread voter disaffection with politics as usual, the two major parties were susceptible to a move by ...
Wed 11th
11:38
Samuel Fleischacker: a Third Concept of Liberty, Judgement and Freedom in Kant and Adam Smith (1999)
[IMG: sf] Fleischacker is a Professor at University of Illinois-Chicago. Though all his degrees and academic appointments are from the USA, he is English in origin. He is a leading Adam Smith scholar, author of On Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations: A Philosophical Companion (2004) and co-editor of Essays on Adam Smith's Moral Philosophy (2010). Amongst currently active thinkers inspired by classical liberalism, he could be taken as representing the other pole to Chandran Kukathas, who was discussed in my last post. Fleischacker is definitely a 'liberal' in what is now the normal sense in America, that is someone of ...
The following three graphs are from the Electoral Commission and show income and expenditure for the three main political parties as reflected in their annual accounts. There are some important exceptions to what they show, such as the money brought in and spent directly by election candidates, though from what I know of these exceptions they paint a similar picture to those annual accounts of the relative trends over time. As Stephen has often noted on this site when reporting on the quarterly donation figures, the Liberal Democrat figures show a consistently higher level of income in this Parliament than ...
Just a few of the snapshots from yesterday's most welcome visit by colleagues and old friends from Bahrain, who work tirelessly for equality and human rights. The al-Khalifa hereditary dictatorship gets away with a policy of demographic engineering, by encouraging immigration from neighbouring Sunni states and granting the newly arrived immigrants citizenship, with a view to further marginalising the indigenous Shi'a population, already deprived of equality and opportunity. See the recent submission of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights and the Cairo Institute for Human Rights Studies to the UN Human Rights Council's 14th Session under the title Bahrain's Universal ...
Percy Bysshe Shelley is remembered by this rather fine momument, installed in 1893, at University College, Oxford. The college was not officially open to visitors when I passed it the other day, but the porters kindly let me in to see the Memorial. As Wikipedia says, the white marble sculpture by Edward Onslow Ford shows a "reclining nude and dead Shelley washed up on the shore at Viareggio in Italy after his drowning". The irorny is that Shelley was expelled from University College for publishing his pamphlet The Necessity of Atheism.
Papers for the Federal Party Conference in Liverpool starting on 18th September are now available online at http://www.libdems.org.uk/autumn_conference_papers.aspx. The main agenda in pdf form is at agenda book rev.pdf; the motions start at page 14. A text-only version should be available in due course for those who have difficulty with large pdf files. The Aberavon & Neath party plans to have a representative in Liverpool. We would be interested in constructive views by non-members, or members who cannot get to either of our two meetings before the conference.
Yes I know that my Lib Dem friends reading this will be pretty appalled that I've never read this book before as it seems to be the manifesto of the economic liberalism promoted by David Laws and his colleagues however ... Continue reading →
In case you missed the previous display, the current plans for the Waitrose supermarket and housing development in Chipping Sodbury will be on display again at the Town Hall tomorrow (Thursday 12 August) from 7pm to 9pm, at the request of Sodbury Town Council. As we mentioned the other day, the plans are also available online here and you can make your comments on the proposal until this Friday, 13 August. On the same web page you can check out the comments other people have already made.
Stumbling and Mumbling picks up and runs with a question I asked recently: Why has political radicalism become synonymous with wanting to see a permanent and massive public debt?
As a local councillor, I want to reach my constituents and make sure they can reach me. If I put out a leaflet it costs a bit and takes a while to deliver, and I can reach thousands of constituents. I write a blog post and then let people know about it by email – that reaches a few hundred (and it's much quicker and cheaper). Or I can tweet and reach about ten. Because, despite the promise of Twitter as providing a great two way link between politicians and those they represent, it's a long way from achieving that. ...
Spotted these photos by Stuart Young the other night. They're really good at capturing the Abbey in all its glory!
At about 4.30pm VN got a call: "how do you fancy coming to Rough Trade records to see some cutting edge electro-rock?" Oh go on then. Upon arrival VN was greeted with the usual East London 'scene' of posh kids in charity shop clothes discussing music that mother really wouldn't approve of, yuh. During the gig everyone was a little too cool to dance, but that didn't stop a strong performance from a new and exciting band. Sleigh Bells are male/female duo from the USA. They make the kind of noise that two people should really not be able to ...
One you may have missed from November 22nd 2007 We love to see a head drop into the basket don't we? There was an amusing moment in the Bloggers' interview with Nick Clegg on Monday. While Nick was answering a question on cannabis, Nick observed that he saw Alex making a "furtive glance" at Richard when Nick said something. With some exasperation, Nick said that it was almost tougher being interviewed by LibDem bloggers than by journos in the Westminster bubble - "and we're in the same party!" It was a very funny moment. We've come a long way, if ...
Wed 11th
09:22
Lib Dems and Tories are Taking Action in the Rage Against Labour's Treasured Faulty Machine
There is a rather excellent article by Simon Jenkins in today's Guardian and one that the We Got Rage Against the Machine to Number One I've Voting Liberal Democrat Lib Dem voters turned doubters would do well to note. It talks about the contrast between the Tory/Lib Dem coalition realising the public expenditure system is faulty and the Labour machine failing to ignore that there is anything wrong as that this is the way we promised things in 1945 and that is the way they should be. He lists examples such as "Andrew Lansley's bid to dismantle tottering NHS bureaucracy. ...
Shropshire Council has admitted it has only ever approved one official request for someone to link to its website, but is insisting that it is right to demand people apply to the council for permission before linking to its website. As I highlighted last month, the Shropshire Council website has a set of terms and conditions says that people must contact the council with details, including their home address, to request permission before they link to the website. However, although there are numerous links to the Shorpshire Council website around the internet (such as this list from Google) the Council ...
From the BBC Shropshire pages: In the late 1800s small settlements began to spread up the hills and across the common land on the Stiperstones above Snailbeach ... Mr Cooter said they were called Squatters' cottages: "The idea was that if you could build a house on the common land overnight and have smoke coming out of the chimney then you could live in it ... Many of the houses have disintegrated since they were abandoned when the lead mines closed.All this will be familiar to readers of Malcolm Saville's Not Scartlet But Gold, but as you will see from ...
Here at 'Liberal Bureaucracy', we do like to perform a public service from time to time, and this is one of those times... The great minds of Liberal Democracy in England have come together and produced this definition; A Liberal Democrat Council Group shall be automatically recognised if; (a) Firstly; it comprises only Party members, (b) Who all went through formal approval as candidates and, (c) Who were sanctioned as official Liberal Democrat candidates by the D.N.O. and (d) Secondly; it has Standing Orders that comply with the Party Constitution and, (e) Provide that group offices should be filled by ...
At the same time as pressure is being applied to properly regulate lobbyists at Westminster, it transpires that the UK Government has been paying a secretive lobbying firm $10,000 (£6,354) a month over the last four years to push American politicians to award contracts to British defence companies and to improve transatlantic relations. The Daily Telegraph reports that O'Brien & Associates, a Washington-based firm of lobbyists, has received more than $500,000 of British taxpayers' money over that period. They say that the lobbying firm, whose president has donated money to both Republican and Democrat politicians, specialises in working on behalf ...
I know many Lib Dems aren't fans of Iain Dale, but I rather like his blog and I think he's a decent guy to boot. And I will always be thankful to him for bringing US-style political memorabilia shops (well, shop) to our shores; many a day as an undergraduate was spent by me sipping a coffee in his first-floor cafe whilst flicking through randomly-selected political books. Anyhow, why am I wittering on about Iain Dale? Well, as I was reading his blog this morning (specifically THIS short post about the proposed graduate tax) I was reminded how strongly I believe ...
Britain was once the biggest economy in the world. Britons invented a spectacular array of the most important inventions of the nineteenth and twentieth century. From the steam railway to television; telephones to the jet engine, British creativity provided the foundation for enormous economic power. On the back of this, the country rose to become by far the most powerful state the world has ever seen. Amassing an empire that comprises one sixth of the planet's land and resources and one quarter of its people, it nevertheless took most pride in a democratic system that was substantially in advance of ...
births and deaths 11th August 1922: birth of Ron Grainer, who composed the Doctor Who theme tune. According to the lore, he was so gobsmacked by Delia Derbyshire's electronic arrangement of the music that he asked her, "Did I really write this?" "Most of it," she replied. Of course he got the on-screen credit and she didn't. 11th August 1932: birth of John Gorrie, director of The Keys of Marinus (1964) and the third episode of The Reign of Terror (1964) 11th August 1994: death of Peter Cushing, who played Doctor Who in Doctor Who and the Daleks (1965) and ...
Regular readers, if there are any, will have noticed that there haven't been many posts recently. This is because I'm very much occupied in having holidays (walking in Wales, enjoying sunshine in Margate and walking in France) and, with another ex-teacher of economics, writing the answers to the questions in an economics text-book. Thus when not away on holiday my head is reeling with such concepts as profit maiximisation and matching Marginal Social Costs and Marginal Social Benefits. However an item on the 6 o'clock news on Radio 4 yesterday compels me to abandon these frivolities for a while and ...
The contents of the Princes' Trust, Destined for the Dole, does not come as a surprise. It is shocking that one in six young people in Wales expect to end up on benefits because other people around them have. Just last month, it was confirmed that Wales' percentage of young people not in education, employment or training remains higher than in England. This report is yet another shocking indictment of Labour-Plaid government's inability to drive real change. Their refusal to face up to the failings of their policies mean that reports like these are likely to become even more regular. ...
When the government announced that the Building Schools for the Future programme was being stopped in Stockton and other towns there was an outcry. People said that all the funding was being taken away, the investment so far was wasted and the new government was depriving the borough of the new schools that had been planned. Now the first stage of the reconsideration has been completed and
girl quits job on dry erase board exposes farmville boss called her hopa theCHIVE I don't know if this is genuine but it's too good not to share (tags: life work) Darwin, C. R. 'This is the Question Marry Not Marry' [Memorandum on marriage]. (7.1838) CUL-DAR210.8.2 Charles Darwin on marriage (hat-tip to Steve) (tags: life)
They say sailing is standing in a cold shower and throwing £50 notes away. Well watching Tall Ships in Hartlepool today did have the rain pouring down, but at £1.90 return on the train from Stockton superb value - and what a wonderful time we had. It was a very long walk to and from the station (same place as where park and ride buses brought people) butapart from that -...
I have been out all day and not seen much news but I have driven on the M6 between Preston and Lancaster. There are two sets of roadworks and in both the road narrows to two lanes. In both you get ample warning that that one lane is closing, but also in both you are notified that the speed limit is 50mph when you are have driving in the roadworks. Why don't we have notice of a lowering of the speed limit. It would make much more sense to inform us before the change happened. Change the world
