A delicate blend of prose and poetry from the Ludlow & Tenbury Wells Advertiser: Missed chances prove costly for Woofferton against Ewyas Harold Reserves
Now I've never been a fan of Harriet Harman, but I have kept my thoughts to myself until the "rodentgate." As a redhead, I found her comments about Danny Alexander exceptionally offensive and and ill thought out and now I barely hide my contempt so apologies if this is a bit slanted however her comments today are also as ill thought out. With the future of British politics looking a little shaky and a general consensus that Coalitions and hung parliaments might become more regular the third largest party hold the key to a safe majority and at the moment ...
Bristol Zoo's gorilla auction this evening raised an incredible total of £427,300. Chipping Sodbury's very own Funky Gibbon went for £8,600. Proceeds from the auction will be split between gorilla conservation work and local Bristol charity Wallace and Gromit's Grand Appeal, which raises funds for the Bristol Children's Hospital and St Michael's Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (Special Care Baby Unit) Congratulations to Bristol Zoo and all involved in the Wow! Gorillas project, which encouraged so much public participation - a real community event.
A man is recovering in hospital after having being mauled by a Great White Shark off Fish Hoek beach in South Africa. Mr Cohen (42) a Canadian born British national who works as an accountant in Cape Town has lost his right leg and left foot to a ten foot Great White that had been sighted off the coast. Two men in their 60's put themselves in danger swimming out to pull him from the water and only the arrival of a seal, the Shark's natural foodstuff distracted the shark from attacking them too. The beach was closed due to ...
[IMG: bundestag] [IMG: Creative Commons License] photo credit: michael pollak On the lunchtime news, I was watching members of the German Bundestag voting for the bailout fund reform. Lots of MPs were putting their voting cards into a ballot box. But, standing just next to the box were several MPs, who were holding their voting cards in the air, rather ostentatiously. Does anyone know why that was? You can see a photo of a couple of these vote card wavers here.
Rubbish was a major topic at the parish council last night as the parish council decided whether to keep up the village green waste skip after the district council ends the provision in the spring. Uttlesford District Council has delayed a decision on green waste collection to allow time for consultation with parish councils that are affected by the changes. At £13,000 per annum, we all agreed that this was too much for a small council to fund, particularly as it is not a statutory responsibility of the parish council. A couple of councillors expressed concern that the elderly who ...
Ouch, ouch, ouch: In case you missed it too, part 1 of the Ed Miliband interview masterclass took place in July. I do have some sympathy with the way in which he is suffering from the decision of picture editors to use unflattering photographs of him (even in The Guardian) but interviews like these will do nothing to discourage them from the collective instinct which now says, "Ed Miliband photo needed? Let's pick one that makes him look foolish or out of his depth".
As far as I am aware, there is only one meeting scheduled for Blyth Town Council next week. The Assets Committee meets at Ebor House, Blyth at 6pm on Tuesday 4th October
Every working parent will empathise with Ellen's account of her morning. Gin and laughter seem to be the antidotes. Nicola Prigg reckons Rory Weal doesn't need EMA now. The Atlantic tell of a 17 year old Pakistani girl whose family faces constant threats because of their refusal to kill her after she was gang raped. Love and Garbage susses out how a blog licensing scheme would work. Meemalee writes about her adventures with lipstick and makes some salient points about the cosmetics industry not catering for all women. In a too rare post, Sara Bedford takes Ed Miliband's tuition fees ...
Monkees post tomorrow. One of the free stories on Greg Egan's site, based around a debate between fictionalised versions of Alan Turing and C.S. Lewis The BMJ on the new Lib Dem drugs policy Speaking of Lewis, Andrew Rilstone is inspired by Lewis to think about morality. Leonard Pierce on the sexism in the new ...
Nick Clegg – currently in Poland representing the UK at the EU Eastern Partnership summit – has an op-ed in today's Independent arguing that more must be done to topple Europe's last dictator in Belarus. As well as his column, the deputy prime minister will also speak to the people of Belarus over the airwaves via European Radio for Belarus and meet with dissidents and democracy campaigners while in Warsaw. Here's an excerpt from the piece: Imagine a country where torture and intimidation are reportedly common place. Where peaceful protesters are locked up - sent to maximum security prison colonies ...
TweetThe seducer, ex-International Monetary Fund Leader Dominique Strauss-Khan seems to have seduced the media as well an a barrage of women. After charges against him in New York were dropped due to reliability of the victim (as I discusshere) the papers have slowly and erroneously been excusing him of any crime. The Evening Standard commits ...
This week without a fanfare - no press release - Reading Council's Labour administration launched a consultation on sheltered housing. It is available here on the Council's website. The Sheltered Housing Services Consultation asks for views on the current service and the proposed changes at 10 of the Council's sheltered housing schemes. The proposals include: changes to the amount of support time provided.changes to the Sheltered Housing Officer's working week the promotion of activities across all the schemesopening up some of the schemes to people under the retirement age who need specialist housing supportviews on the current night service This ...
This piece originally appeared on 29th September on Huffington Post UK: Britain's colossal National Debt looms large over the Labour conference in Liverpool, with the party seeking to harden its credibility on bringing the public financies under control. As far as the Liberal Democrat and Conservative plan to cut the deficit goes, it's a cocktail of tax rises (like VAT) and spending cuts (take your pick). For Labour, even the cut-sceptic Ed Balls now reminds us about Labour's pre-election plans to cut welfare, education and the Home Office budget and speaks of getting debt onto "a downward path." But is ...
[IMG: comdex-fiorina-01] [IMG: Creative Commons License] photo credit: Carly Fiorina from 南宮博士 I couldn't find anything on the web about this, so thought I would raise this point. It does seem quite extraordinary that Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina have crossed paths from opposite directions. In 1999, Carly Fiorina became CEO of Hewlett Packard. Then, in 2010, she ran for the US Senate for the Republicans in California against Barbara Boxer and lost. In 2010, Meg Whitman ran for office as Californian Governor for the Republicans against Jerry Brown and lost. She then became CEO of Hewlett Packard in September ...
I've been working through my list of things to follow up on after last weeks trip to Birmingham for the Liberal Democrats' Autumn Conference, including writing up various blog posts. To speed things up a bit I thought I'd use this edition of 'Random Thoughts' to round-up all those things from conference that I want to note but that don't really deserve a blog post of their own. A summary of the formal business of conference, including details of the motions passed, are available from the Liberal Democrat's website. Consultative sessions Given I was traveling down on the Saturday morning ...
I wrote earlier about how Renfrewshire Councillor Mike Dillon has returned to the Liberal Democrats almost exactly four months after leaving to join the SNP. It's hardly surprising he came back, given what I found out a wee while ago. Scottish Leader Willie Rennie, who met with Mike this morning, was asked on his Facebook page if Mike had apologised for calling him a Tory. That quote from Mike was thrown at Willie across the Holyrood Chamber at FMQs today: On Councillor Dillon, I will quote what he said on 3 July: "Members and supporters of the LibDems do not ...
While it is easy to lampoon Ed Milliband and the speech he gave to his party conference, he had one big idea that is worth looking at: that of bringing moral values into government's dealings with business, to reward the good and punish the bad. On the face of it, what could possibly be wrong with that? It is better to have more training, more R&D, better cared for workers, a social conscience, environmental sustainability. Let's reward the companies that go the extra mile to deliver these things, and punish those that merely follow the rules. Companies that merely tick ...
The Liberal Democrats' German cousins, the Free Democratic Party, in an attempt to gain votes and differentiate themselves from their conservative coalition partners tried to entice voters by dabbling in a little Euroscepticism in recent state elections. With falling poll ratings and a population increasingly doubtful at picking up the tab for spendthrift Mediterranean states, it appeared to be a strategy that was destined to succeed. Yet in Berlin, they polled 1.8% of the vote. Sound familiar? Like the FDP, Liberal Democrat members are fretting about retaining their identity whilst in coalition. However, the plight of Philipp Rösler's FDP has ...
Mike Thomas continued by saying there were a range of issues on pages 38 to 42 which relate to earlier years, which needed to be attended to. There was a recommendation on page 42. There were weaknesses in internal control. He asked the committee to check the quality of the financial statements as there were ...
He said this had caused the issue of the deadline for approval not being met, there needed to be improvements to working papers and in non-current assets. However the impact had not changed the General Fund balance. The last stages would be there by Friday along with the £6 million change. However the £6 million ...
As the Syrian regime continues to kill protestors, events in Libya are conspiring to make life a bit more difficult for President Assad and his government. Syria exports about 100,000 barrels of crude oil per day, or at least, it did until European Union sanctions were imposed last month. In the scheme of things, that isn't very much, but it represents about 25% of the country's earnings denominated in foreign currencies. Virtually all of it was bought by EU-based customers, so the Syrians are looking for alternative purchasers. And that search is made more difficult by the resumption of exports ...
Durham council taxpayers could lose £4 million if an Icelandic Court rules that way. An Audit Committee question revealed this when the Director of Resources said that the county expects to recoup 98 pence in the pound of £6 million of Icelandic investments in Landsbanki and Glitnir provided that an Icelandic Court upholds the original ruling that local authorities are "preferential creditors". If, however, that ruling is overturned and Durham finds itself thrown in with all the other investors, the cash to come back is likely to drop to 30p in the pound. Take that together with the investment of ...
I have been meaning to post this video for weeks and weeks and am kicking myself for only just getting round to it. Recently my friend Graeme spent a couple of months in Uganda, volunteering as a teacher. The organisation he went with, Volunteer Uganda, made a video of their experiences which sums up their work and leisure time. I'll let them all speak for themselves. I did ask Graeme's permission to post this, but I promised I wouldn't comment on his trousers. Don't let that stop you, though........ Being part of something which makes so many children very obviously ...
Thu 29th
15:53
Opinion: Dr. Balls makes the right diagnosis, offers the same old failed prescriptions
Leading commentators on the political economy must have been flattered to hear many of their principles and policies given lip service by Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls this week in his speech to the Labour party conference. Flattered only to be deceived, sadly, as lip service is all he paid; underneath the rhetorical support for a reformed political economy promoted by the likes of Will Hutton, the Institute for Public Policy Research, Ha-Joon Chang and others, Balls' prescription for the UK economy amounts to little more than tinkering with the same old policy levers that haven't worked in the past. Mr. ...
Tom Sault introduced the Statement of Accounts covering report and Appendix. He said the Merseyside Pension Fund was part of the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral's accounts and this was a recommendation from the Pension Committee. There was the report to the District Auditor, Annual Governance Statement and letter of representation as well as the Action ...
Cllr Jim Crabtree (Chair) said "Good evening" to start the meeting. He asked for any declarations of interest. No declarations of interest were declared. The minutes of the meeting held on the 30th June 2011 were received. An officer introduced the Merseyside Pension Fund accounts and Appendix. He said they had been audited and the ...
I'm on holiday, so I need some reading material for the bits when we're taking time out from being tourists. A good book, perhaps. But no, I'm a bureaucrat, so something educational, methinks. Indeed, what I have is highly informative, and as you certainly haven't read it, and you almost certainly won't, I feel obliged to give you some snippets... Today, I've learned about HRT. No, not hormone replacement therapy, hand rolling tobacco. Now, I have to admit that I don't smoke, and never have done. I do rather like the smell of a good cigar, and I find pipe ...
Amazon have finally delivered my copy of The Purple Book. Over the next few days, I shall read and carefully analysis Labour's new potential philosophy on the economy, society, social affairs and the political system. The book aims to "end the role of the big state" and, although I remain sceptical, I shall approach this ...
That's the title of a Radio 2 programme which looks at The Story of Pick of the Pops, which is celebrating it's fiftieth anniversary this week. It's a great show, introduced by Sir Tim Rice, and is available here on BBC iPlayer until October 4th. I was trawling around YouTube last night and found this remarkable little curiosity. It's Alan Freeman rehearsing what I think was his last (current) Pick of the Pops run down on Radio 1. WARNING: Contains swear words.
It is great news to hear that, after extending the franchise to 16 year olds in 2006, the Isle of Man is going to the polls today - and for the first time including 16 & 17 year olds! However, (and it seems almost always) we are rather slow in enriching our democracy, whether it be ...
Writer and Artist: Jeremy Owen Editor and Story Collaborator: Greg Freeland II Publisher: Burly Comics What's it about? The first issue of this new comic introduces us to Mike, who is moving to Albuquerque, and it sets up a few mysteries at the same time as portraying a seemingly uneventful enounter at a diner. Our hero is large, gay, and generous, yet carries with him a secret that makes him taciturn around the people he encounters; and the way those people react to him forms as much part of the first issue as his own motivation. He is the alter-ego ...
Professor David Nutt has written another excellent short article looking at the relative harms of alcohol and cannabis use and how the current legislation is illogical. Unfortunately I'm not going to subscribe to read the full report but his article says all it needs to. My common point when it comes to these factors is even if you strip away my moral reasons for drugs legalisation the current prohibition is illogical, as it doesn't look at the relative harms to society or the individual, merely keeping alcohol legal because it's currently legal. "Estimating the true relative harms of alcohol and ...
It is great news to hear that, after extending the franchise to 16 year olds in 2006, the Isle of Man is going to the polls today – and for the first time including 16 & 17 year olds! However, (and it seems almost always) we are rather slow in enriching our democracy, whether it be changing the voting system, reforming the House of Lords, or extending the franchise to 16 & 17 year olds. It is something both Liberal Youth & the British Youth Council have campaigned hard for. Even our Leader, Nick Clegg, who holds special responsibility for ...
So, Alasdair Allan, Scottish Schools minister has decided that our kids need lessons in Scottish Studies to make sure they learn about their culture and history. To be fair, he may have a point. I know my education is some time ago, and things have definitely got better based on my daughter's experience, but we learned about the Picts and the Jacobites in history and very little in between. We learnt a half decent Dashing White Sergeant and Gay Gordons in PE, but we didn't do much in the way of Scottish literature. I mean, I went to Wick High ...
What a brilliant day for Cardigan! The Welsh Assembly Minister for Heritage, Huw Lewis AM, officially announced in the grounds of Cardigan Castle this morning that the Cardigan Castle project has been successful in drawing down some £4.5m in European Regional Development Funding. This goes on top of the £4.7m funding that was secured back in March from the Heritage Lottery Fund and which I blogged about here at the time. Cardigan Castle in 2014? It's going to happen! This means that over £9m has now been secured for this pivotal project not only for Cardigan and our ...
The stalker-ish nature of Facebook is nicely sent up by this cartoon: [IMG: Zuckerberg is watching you] See the rest of it at AllThingsD.
I see that KMonline are reporting utter chaos as part of the new East Kent Access road is open. Do Kent highways ever get things right, while the new road will undoubtably eventually improve Thanet's links to the outside world, it seems as with so much here in East Kent to be poorly managed and a little late, by the time it's fully operational most of Pfizer's will have gone. Thanet traffic misery, seems unavoidable, Westwood Cross is as bad as ever, even more worrying for me will be the building of Tesco-on-sea just along Marine Terrace, which for much ...
I am sitting here in complete disbelief. I have been for about 15-20 minutes now. To invoke the memory of Jack Buck means that something just incredible must have happened and it did overnight. I have seen many things in the world of sport. Not a lot can phase me but seriously the way the baseball gods ended the American League regular season was just completely off the charts. I started writing this blog post over two hours ago and I still genuinely cannot believe what I just (well a couple of hours ago) saw. The scenario was simple. The ...
Stood next to me in the above picture is the athlete Jonathan Edwards. Jonathan is a former British triple jumper. He is a former Olympic, Commonwealth, European and World champion, and has held the world record in the event since 1995.Following his retirement as an athlete, Edwards has worked as an athletics commentator and presenter for BBC television. Formerly a devout Christian, he also presented episodes of the BBC Christian worship programme Songs of Praise, until he gave up these views in 2007. He is a member of the London Organising Committee for the Olympic Games.The highlights of his career ...
Good news this lunchtime for the Renfrewshire Liberal Democrat Council Group. Cllr Mike Dillon, who joined the SNP Group in May has reconsidered and come back to us. Here he is with Willie today. Mike has clearly seen that the grass is not greener on the SNP side. I am glad that both he and the Council group, led by Cllr Eileen McCartin, have been grown up enough to let bygones be bygones. It takes a lot of character to do that in these circumstances and I'm proud of them both. Mike Dillon said: I am delighted to rejoin the ...
I wanted to update you on the latest news I have about the University-Hospital parking study. I, along with Cllr Goodall attended a meeting of the steering group yesterday where the following information was made public:- There were 376 responses to the RBC transport survey: a response rate of 10%. Therefore, although a relatively high response to a Council transport consultation the views expressed do not reflect the majority of residents living in the area. 92% of respondents were 'permanent' residents, 2% were 'temporary' residents and 6% were not residents in the area. 47% of the respondents were customers in local ...
When I was reading Ed Miliband's speech one section sounded eerily familiar: "The patient frustrated when they can't be seen by the person they want.The victim of crime who just wants their case properly investigated.You know what it's like.You stand in the queue.You hang on the phone.You fill in the form.And then all you get?Computer says no." Thankfully The Spectator Blog highlighted what it reminded me of: "First the great monoliths of centrally-run bureaucracies must be opened up - and run for the sake of the people, the patients, the pupils. These days individuals are powerless in the face of ...
Capitalists are frequently accused of being mercenary, in the sense that they are fixated on accumulating the greatest amount of wealth at the expense of other important issues. Their critics like to present themselves, in comparison, as focused on less tawdry, more important matters: happiness; social justice; public welfare. Yet if once looks at the writings of anti-capitalists, they do seem to spend a lot of time talking about money. My latest post on the ASI blog explores why egalitarians are wrong to seek to equalise wealth across society. According to one commentator, it's "one of the best AS blog ...
Thu 29th
12:26
Urgent action required: Yousef Nadarkhani: guilty of apostasy because of ancestry, not because of pr...
Last week many of us were reading on friends' blogs, Facebook pages, walls, letters in the press, and so on ...Continue reading »
Thu 29th
12:15A Radical Activist Grandma writes... Lib Dems must make their voice heard on mental health and disab...
Suzanne Fletcher had an experience many Lib Dems have experienced at the party's conference: she'd prepared a speech but there was not time to call her during the debate. However, Lib Dem Voice is delighted, with Suzanne's permission, to share her thoughts with our readers... The speech I didn't make at Lib Dem conference on the Employment & Support Allowance (ESA) and Work Capability Assessments First of all congratulations to the Disability Consortium for their well-run campaign to get people to come and vote in this debate, although I was certainly going to be here anyway, along with my colleagues ...
I haven't seen Ed Miliband's speech to the Labour Party Conference, however I have read it, unfortunately courtesy of the Telegraph's website (link) - which means I don't have to put up with his usual poor delivery. I have to say, it reads fairly well. It's not that I agree with him, in fact some points make me pretty annoyed, but I think it reads like a speech that the less informed political viewer would want to hear. (That's the beauty of being in opposition though, especially just under four years from the next election - you can say whatever ...
Holy Michael Archangel, defend us in the day of battle; be our safeguard against the wickedness and snares of the ...Continue reading »
Here's my 17-minute video report from the autumn 2011 Liberal Democrat party conference in Birmingham. I enjoyed it, and hopefully that comes across, but at the same time I don't think Michael Palin or Stephen Fry have too much to worry about in terms of me taking TV presenting work off them.
A little known gem is the Saint Georges Hotel, on the corner of Langham Place and Regent Street, or more to the point its cafe / bar / restaurant on the 15th floor. The easily scared may worry about stepping into a lift to rise 15 floors and see the inside proudly emblazoned with a sign reading "Beyond maintenance". The easily confused may be put off by the highest ratio of different menus per table available in any cafe, bar or restaurant in London (probably). But ignore all that, walk up the stairs if you must, deploy a flame thrower ...
John Pugh MP and Lynn Thompson have led concerns locally about the safety on the Coastal Rd. A number of accidents have happened. At last night's Area Committee. Cllr David Pearson (Independent Conservative) was very supportive of the move and money was found from Ainsdale and Dukes Ward along with a contribution from the central Southport pot to implement the plan which appears in the papers as: Locations for the four signs have been identified, and it is suggested that two pairs of signs should be located at a position approximately mid-point between Pinfold Lane and Shore Road and approximately ...
Nick Clegg has a piece in the Independent today in which he outlines the abuses of human rights carried out by the Government of Belarus. This Summer, after protesting was banned by the Government (which, by the way, shut down social networks in much the way certain people were calling for here during the riots), people took to the streets and applauded as Ruth Collins reported on the Huffington Post. An ingenious idea, which was soon met with a ban on applause. I like the fact that Nick is using pretty strong language, not the sort you often find in ...
It's only Thursday but for some folk they must be wishing the week was already over and they could look forward to a quiet weekend with the family aware from the glare of the media. Here in Liverpool the Labour party has been holding their conference at the Echo Arena where Ed Miliband has not had the best time of things as he attempted to stamp his mark as Leader one year after beating his brother to the prize. But it has hardly been a conference where he has set the world on fire. His speech has been received with ...
Southport Area Committee met last night and among the items of interest was the proposal for 20 mile an hour speed limits. The papers can be found here In Item 13 you will find the plans for such a limit to be introduced in part of Birkdale. This is part of a wider campaign that Birkdale Lib Dems have been waging to improve safety around schools in the area. The exact proposal -including a mention for Lib Dem transport Minister Norman Baker reads: The first is the area bounded by, but not including Liverpool Road, Halsall Road and Guildford Road, ...
Southport Area Committee met last night-more of which later. One of the 20 odd questions from the public was put in by Geoff Carter. He asked whether the Lancashire flag could be flown from the Southport Town Hall to celebrate the victory of Lancashire County Cricket Club in the LV County Championship. This is the first time that Lancashire have won outright since 1934 As Geoff pointed out all the Lancashire home games were played on the Lancs coast at Blackpool, Liverpool and Southport. The Southport match -held at S&B- was the best attended. Dave Rimmer went on to describe ...
I have linked to the BBC report on the numbers of babies adopted from care. There have always been very few of these as they are basically the babies that are abandoned at birth.I am not sure myself that the Government are right to regret that fewer babies are abandoned at birth. I would think that it would be better if they were not abandoned. However, that is the government's view.Similarly
[IMG: Lynne, Katherine and Dave visit the cafe at the MIND building] At Monday night's Area Committee meeting in the Hornsey Library, I and the other local Lib Dem councillors agreed which community groups would benefit from small 'Making the Difference' grants to improve the local area. This year we had some great bids in from Stroud Green residents – all of which got funded. Projects that got the go-ahead in Stroud Green were: £3,500 for Mind to recruit and train volunteers to help out at their centre on Stappleton Hall Road (see cafe in picture). £500 for the Friends ...
The Royal College of Surgeons says poor access to facilitieslike operating theatres and scans means some abdominal emergencies are notspotted in time. Emergency major gastrointestinal (abdominal) surgery has oneof the highest mortalities, which can reach 50% in the over 80s, the reportsays. I wascycling to the House on October 4, 2001, to wind up a LibDem emergency debateon Afghanistan. A few minutes before 10.00, when the debate was due to start, Iwas knocked off by a motorist who did a u-turn on Millbank without looking. Itwas a hell of a bang, and bystanders offered to take me to hospital, but ...
Time and again during Lib Dem conference I heard serious voices urging the party not to lament the voters we have in past year or so – but to focus on where we might find voters going forward.. It is of course quite possible that with time, some improvement in the economy, and an increasingly mad Labour party, some lost voters will return to us. But hoping or expecting or praying for the lost to find their way back to us is hardly what you call " a plan". So what should the Lib Dem plan be? First and foremost, ...
Thu 29th
10:25Interviewing Mark Sullivan, the founder of the party's new electoral database supplier
During the Liberal Democrat conference in Birmingham, I had the chance to quiz Mark Sullivan (the founder of VAN, which is becoming the party's new electoral database software under the name CONNECT). I'm (like others) excited about the possibilities CONNECT will bring, partly because I've worked with EARS for just about two decades now. It has helped produce some stupendous election results and people involved with it have worked tremendously hard. But it also has some major limitations, particularly the number of bugs (including more than once data being lost on polling day), the haphazard record of delivering new features ...
I must say this item in todays i newspaper, I found quite a surprise, basically it reports that Palestinians have lost faith in Tony Blair's role as Middle East peace broker. It's touching that long suffering Palestinians, ever did trust him. Back in 1967, Israel did quite rightly what it had to, in order to protect itself, forty years later there is no excuse for them to hold onto land taken then. Palestine also has a right to exist, as much as any nation, it's not good enough that America and her allies assist Israel's long term strategy, which is ...
A few days ago I blogged about the temporary implosion of the Tory administration on Surrey County Council following the overthrow of their group leader. I also described how procedure meant that the deposed leader, Dr Povey, would remain council leader for the next cabinet meeting and speculated whether enough cabinet members would be left to make it quorate. Unfortunately there were enough cabinet members to make the meeting quorate. And Dr Povey's last act as leader was to do immeasurable and completely unnecessary damage to libraries across Surrey. Despite the fact that he knew that a new cabinet and ...
Thu 29th
09:45
Case for electrification west of Cardiff undermined by Welsh Government's failure to engage claims A...
The case for extending the electrification of the main line to Swansea has been undermined by the failure of the Welsh Government to fully engage with the business case, the Welsh Liberal Democrat Assembly Member for South Wales West, Peter Black has claimed. Mr. Black was responding to the contents of a Freedom of Information request to the Department for Transport on how the business case for electrification was put together. The Minister of State in that department reveals that she and her colleagues 'worked very closely with the Welsh Government to consider how the case for electrification to Swansea ...
Were you at Liberal Democrat Conference last week? What did you make of your hotel? And particularly if you were staying at the officially designated "Conference Hotel" - are they all that? In the absence of the Hyatt Regency Birmingham offering a feedback form on checking out, I've been having a think about it this morning, now that I've more or less recovered from Conference a week later. Does competition keep these massive hotels to good service and prices? Or do they know we'll block-book and charge us through the nose...? Yes, you're right, it's not a toughie, is it? ...
Andrew Stunell, local government minister, told delegates at Lib Dem party conference last week that councils will be allowed to charge an empty homes premium – an additional council tax payable on properties that have been left empty for two years or longer. The proposals will also allow councils to keep the extra council tax for an umber of years for new homes brought back into use – this sould be wroth around £9,000 per home. Since becomnig a councillor in Southwark I've made a number of enquiries about empty homes in SOuthwark. Currently we have around 5,250 empty homes ...
When I spoke in the Welsh Government's debate on public services on Tuesday I pointed out that Ministers had a bit of a cheek lecturing Councils about joint appointments and saving money when they were retaining 50 or more executives in the NHS on protected salaries despite the fact that their jobs have been restructured out of existence. This morning's Western Mail has up-to-date details following a freedom of information request by a Plaid Cymru AM. These figures show that more than 50 executives earning up to almost £97,500 are still on protected pay as part of the All Wales ...
Good to see a Liberal Democrat MEP taking up this cause in a press release: Liberal Democrat London MEP Sarah Ludford has called for the blocking of plans by European Parliament bosses known as the 'bureau' to spend £26 million (€30 million) on improving MEP offices in the Parliament's Strasbourg building. The Parliament is currently obliged under the EU treaties – fixed by the 27 national governments – to sit in both Brussels and Strasbourg in a 'travelling circus'. But in June a majority of MEPs voted in favour of maintaining a single seat in Brussels, which would save 19,000 ...
TweetWill we now see the distribution of pro-adoption leaflets? Adoption is an emotive subject. The idea of children being vulnerable, parentless and isolated is a tear-jerker. However, seemingly superceding this is the idea of a woman 'carrying my own baby'. The fixation on the 'bump', the internal kick and creation of life seems to be ...
Kenneth Clarke complains that legal aid is costing the average taxpayer £39 per year. The average taxpayer is not eligible for legal aid unless if he is accused of a criminal offence. There is no means test for legal aid ... Continue reading →
At the beginning of the year, we were told that the project to demolish the existing Warwick Mall in Cheadle and replace it with a new building would start in February. The new building includes ground floor retail (which now looks like it will be Sainsbury's) and 14 apartments on the first and second floors. Work is scheduled to take about a year to complete. Since then, things have dragged on and nothing has happened. We were given a date of September by the contractors, which now looks to have slipped to October. None of us would put money on ...
The Labour conference in Liverpool has rather descended into a comedy of errors. The Leader's speech was badly delivered and only patchily coherent. The policies- such as they are- that have emerged from the conference have mostly inspired indifference, but in one or two cases actual hostility. Even the comedy turn of the teenage speaker which seems to infect party conferences from time to time ended up being rather less than it appeared. All in all this conference seems set to cement Ed Miliband's image as a bit of a loser, and to inspire no one with the image of ...
I'm spending a few days at my mothers which (amongst other things) enabled me to catch up with my oldest mate last night so we took advantage of the great weather to pop into a pub beer garden to have a pint or four. Now I know that makes us a wicked binge drinkers so I hope society will forgive us for our ways. Anyhoo, we started putting the world to rights and got onto pub closures. Westminster does seem to have woken up that this is a problem but they seem to be (mainly) ignoring the two big issues. ...
[Originally posted at Dale&Co, 27/09/11] One of the less pleasant characteristics of the Coalition government is its cavalier attitude towards transparency, accountability and Parliamentary process. This is part of a more general impoverishment of democratic practice. We hear reports of serious, but relatively small scale, issues such as Ministerial advisors using private email accounts for ...
Kirsty Joanna Doig of Tissywu Sculptural Art & Design writes : "This Weekend (1st and 2nd October from 12pm - 5pm - both days) local artists are having a Wasps Creative Pop Up Weekend event, held in 3 different locations. One of them is in my lovely new studio, which is located on the ground floor of Meadow Mill, West Henderson Wynd, Dundee, DD1 5BY. This is an opportunity for you to experience what goes on inside artists studios and of course to buy art directly from us or have a privately created commission. The other two locations are in ...
Yesterday, I had the pleasure of attending the Celebrate Age Network's Information Fayre in Logie and St John's (Cross) Church - see right. It was a very well attended event, with lots of local residents visiting the many information stalls. The Celebrate Age Network is taking part in the West End Community Fayre as part of Christmas Week late November to further highlight its activities. Later yesterday, along with the other City Council political group leaders, representatives from Dundee and Angus Chamber of Commerce and senior council officers, I participated in the council's Local Economy Monitoring Group, discussing the current ...
There will be a coffee morning in support of the RNLI on Friday 14th October, starting at 10 am at St Mary's Church Hall (next to the Town Council Offices ) I will be there ( up to my elbows in washing up, as usual ), and I urge you to come along for a coffee and buy cakes, in support of this excellent cause
Tonight was a short meeting and it took place in the same location as the meeting last night. Some of the same people even attended! Some advice was given to reduce the height of peoples' garden hedges. This would lessen the chance that any potential criminal can hide behind the hedges as well as use the high hedges as cover when breaking into people's homes. We heard from Southfield's new police sergeant who mentioned that Southfield ward, which covers some of Acton and the section of Chiswick in Ealing, has has a pretty low crime rate compared to the surrounding ...
One day last week I sat down to watch a debate on the world financial crisis on BBC World News, featuring half a dozen world class economists on stage and a lot of other experts in the audience. About half way through, I realised that the only feature of the programme I was engaging with, ...
It's time for Liberal Drinks to have a few beermats. But what colour should they be? Or rather, what two colours should they be, because you can print different designs on each side? The party seems to be getting over its love affair with 'aqua'. Strangely it never really started one with 'dark red' even though it notionally had equal status to aqua in the Liberal Democrat brand guidelines! I've thrown together a few designs and would really appreciate it you would vote to tell me which ones you like best. Just tick the ones you might be prepared to ...
