My name is Jennie, and I use a mooncup. ( Cut for people who are squeamish about periods and ladyparts ) Seriously though, why would anyone want to broadcast their incompetence with their own genitals so smugly? [IMG: comment count unavailable] comments
This is a public service announcement. Travel arrangements for United fans for tomorrow:- You leave London via the M1 and then go onto the M6 for Manchester. Now, those numbers shouldn't be hard to remember, should they? [IMG: ;-)] socialise this: [IMG: add 'Travel Arrangements For Tomorrow' a Del.icio.us] [IMG: add 'Travel Arrangements For Tomorrow' a digg] [IMG: add 'Travel Arrangements For Tomorrow' a Stumble Upon] [IMG: add 'Travel Arrangements For Tomorrow' a FaceBook] [IMG: add 'Travel Arrangements For Tomorrow' a Twitter]
Last night I made a rare visit (these days) to the cinema. What drew me was the opening night of the Iron Lady. Everyone of my generation has an opinion of Margaret Thatcher, you either like her or loathe her. I've always been in the latter camp and the film didn't change my view. I ...
A few days ago I added a comment to the Bishop of Lancaster's new year pastoral letter. He was asking whether the Church should continue to fund schools that are Catholic in name only. That answer is easy - the sign should come down and funding should stop. He also puts the more difficult question as to whether Catholics should support schools in which the majority are not practising Catholics. I posted an answer which mentioned the numbers, and the enthusiasm and motivation of those who are Catholic. The question of church school funding came up at the hustings meeting ...
Welcome to Broxtowe Enews, brought to you by the Liberal Democrats and edited by David Watts, the leader of the Lib-Dems on Broxtowe Borough Council. A special welcome to the new readers who signed up over the holiday and may I wish all our readers a very happy new year and I hope everyone had the opportunity of a good break over Christmas. Sadly I received yet more proof that I'm getting old, as the optician has dictated that I start wearing reading glasses! Apparently my argument that my arms just needed stretching a bit wasn't persuasive! 1. Cllr Tom ...
How did Sky News end up printing a picture of Gatley – with added monkey – and saying it was Bournemouth? Back in 2010 a tree next to the Horse and Farrier in Gatley fell across Old Hall Road, crushing a Mini. I took a few photos and put them on the blog – you can find the post here. This is the original photo I took and published. Sky News have been looking for photos of storm damage and they printed this one in their article. Here's the photo Sky have published: [IMG: Not Bournemouth, but Gatley] Notice that ...
Earlier this evening I listened to this superb documentary on BBC Radio 4. John Arlott is remembered as a cricket commentator - except that it is more than 30 years since he retired as a commentator and 20 years since his death, so I fear that many followers of the game today have hardly heard of him. Suffice to say, he was the greatest cricket commentator there has ever been. But there was far more to him than that. He was twice a Liberal candidate and, in the days when the party was at its lowest ebb, he was probably ...
Tesco has recently announced that their Open Recruitment application process for their new Yardley store with start on Monday 9th January. If you wish to apply follow the following steps: 1) Go to www.tesco-careers.com and look on the right for a hyperlink called 'Find out about working in store' and click on it. 2) Under 'Search', type 'Yardley' 3) You should now see the job adverts specific to the Yardley store 4) After reading the job advert and terms click on the 'Apply Now' link towards the bottom of the page. 5) Answer the questions you are asked in the ...
The story so far: Councillor Broadthwaite has been enormously impressed by the Statistical Unit in Scunthorpeshire County Council and has persuaded Kenneth Spotlessnob to set one up in Odanglesex. FROM: Hamish Carpenter, Transformational Excellence Manager TO: Silesia Jones, Equality Consultant Silesia - I see you got the same e-mail I did from someone called Margot Outforle, Head of the Statistical Unit. Did you know we had a Statistical Unit? Seems it's in Neil's empire. I'll ask Kenneth, but wondered if you were more in the know. Seeing that you and I already do a lot of statistical work, as do ...
The former Tatton Cinema has now completed its makeover, with the banner going up on Friday. We firmly believe that the site needs to be put to good use – and will continue to work with the developers and the Council to sure a long-term future for the location in the heart of Gatley. However, in the meantime, this is certainly an improvement to what was there before.
Apparently he does, if the quote in today's Scotsman is to be believed. A bit of a storm has erupted over comments reportedly made by Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg while on a brief visit to Scotland. Choosing to comment personally on Scotland's constitutional future, he argued that "all the evidence suggests that [support for devolution] is the mainstream of opinion and the extremists are those who either think that we need to yank Scotland out of the United Kingdom tomorrow, or those who say there should be no further change at all". As anyone living in Scotland - or, ...
A reminder that there is still time to go on line and comment on the decision to designate Stalbridge Dock as the official "sub regional" waste site for Liverpool. The deadline is 20th January and you can comment on line at this link http://www.wasteplanningmerseyside.gov.uk/site.do?id=720
Tonight's episode on Thursday was titled "Dying to be Thin". The show had some truly shocking statistics. The show opened with the statistic that 200 5-7 year-olds are being hospitalised a year with anorexia. They are FIVE, SIX & SEVEN year olds for crying out loud. They shouldn't be worrying about their weight! How bad ...
I've just caught up with Endeavour, the Morse one-off prequel on ITV. It's a masterpiece which was hugely enjoyable. I particularly enjoyed Roger Allam's performance as DI Fred Thursday. And I loved that bit at the end when Morse, in the driving seat of one of his beloved Jaguars, was asked where he saw himself in 20 years time, and he looked in his rearview mirror and saw John Thaw as Morse. Brilliant. Endeavour is still on ITV Player for the next two days. Oh me, oh my, I hope they make a full series out of this! I suspect ...
The Guardian reports: The Liberal Democrats' biggest donor, who has been on the run for three years after being convicted of a multimillion pound theft, has been arrested by police in the Dominican Republic, the Guardian can disclose... A City of London police spokesman confirmed Brown's arrest. "We are pleased to hear that Michael Brown has been detained by authorities in the Dominican Republic, and are currently establishing contact with them to find out further details about his arrest. "Clearly, at some stage we will look for his return to the UK, so he can serve the sentence for the ...
Some time ago I wrote a post about the facilities the Americans left behind at Trevisker St Eval. I reflected at the time that it would be a tragedy if these buildings were left empty while the local community faced the closure of its Post Office, shop and community facilities. Two years on, after an ...
Lib Dem Voice has polled our members-only forum to discover what Lib Dem members think of various political issues, the Coalition, and the performance of key party figures. Over 550 party members responded, and we've published the full results here. Today 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. My LibDemVoice colleague Mark Pack has already provided the highlights of our latest survey, but I know there are completists among you who cannot rest easy until the full ...
It seem not a week goes by without the far left of the Labour Party appearing somewhere, waving banners and complaining about the cuts the government is making. In Andover its usually orchestrated by ex-communists and fellow travellers whose support is minimal or non-existant. Its good therefore to see that this week the leadership of the Labour Party is actually acknowledging that cuts are necessary (see http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-16452539.) I am therefore grateful to Ian Swales, MP for Recar for the following list of cuts they don't tell you about. I reproduce in full his list and comments. Nothing more can be ...
Twelfth Night is usually the time I take down the Christmas cards, but last evening I went instead to Cambridge, to hear the East of England LibDem MEP Andrew Duff give his verdict on the situation regarding Britain's relationship with the rest of the EU following David Cameron's disconcerting performance at the Brussels Summit last ...
I should admit that this is something I don't say very often but... Medway Council have done a good job. I know, I surprised myself... I had to have a little lie down after I said it! It seems that plans for a new University Technical College in the Brompton area are set to go through with support from the Baker Dearing trust. It will have 600 places and open to 14-19 year old students with specialities in Engineering and Construction, which makes sense bearing in mind the Engineering pedigree in Brompton. Whilst offering traditional subjects like Maths, Science etc... ...
Way back in 2008 I wrote a post about silly names given to children and it's proved to be one of my most popular posts - even though I suspect most people are actually looking for public transport between Edgware and Victoria. Now officials in New Zealand have released a list of names they have refused to allow parents to give to their children. There are no specifically banned names, officials insist. But the rules state that they must be less than 100 characters long, not appear to confer a position on the child (so Princess and Justice have both ...
They're creepy and they're kooky, Mysterious and spooky, They're all together ooky, The Addams Family. Today is the centenary of daddy Addams, that is Charles Addams the man who drew Gomez, Morticia, Uncle Fester, Pugsley, Wednesday, Lurch, Grandmama and Thing. He was born in Westfield, New Jersey on this day 100 years ago. He father who had studied to be an architect encouraged him to draw. In 1933 he joined the layout team of True Dectective magazine and spent his time touching up pictures of dead corpses, removing the blood from them. He complained (quite correctly) that a lot of ...
Liberal Democrat ward councillor for this area, Darren Fower, says he has now reported some offensive graffiti located on a green box, situated in Hawkshead Way (North Gunthorpe). Commenting, Darren said: "I'd rather not go into details as to what some of the graffiti portray, suffice as to say that its not desirable imagery for what is a very nice suburban setting." If you know of any graffiti issue in your street, then please do report it to the city council. You can do so by clicking here! Darren says he believes the green box is something to do with ...
It has been odd watching the Labour party over the last 18 months. If ever an opposition has had a golden opportunity, it has surely been this. With the economy in a mess, any government would be forced to make tough, unpopular decisions right now. Combine that with the nature of coalition, and scoring some palpable hits should be a cynch. Somehow, however, they appear to have missed almost every target in their path. Liam Byrne's cynical gaffe, leaving a note to his successor about there being 'no money left' may not have single handedly lost Labour the next election ...
Day 7 In your own space, create a list of at least three fannish things you'd love to receive, something you've wanted but were afraid to ask for - a fannish wish-list of sorts. Drop a link to your wish-list in this post. Maybe someone will grant a wish. Maybe you will grant a wish. If any wishes are granted, we'd love it if you link them to this post. Darn - I know I keep thinking of icons that I wish I had, but can I remember them now? Let's see: 1) Tiffany Aching. I always end up using ...
Whatever the outcome of Nick Clegg's renewed initiative on the funding of political parties, it is unlikely that enough agreement will be reached between the main protaganists so as to entirely eliminate the suspicion of foul-play. This is best illustrated by today's Telegraph, which has made itself a bit of a specialist on this issue, when they report on the views of the Parliamentary Standards watchdog that wealthy donors appear to be buying Government policy by securing "preferential" access to ministers and senior politicians. Nobody should pretend that this is an exclusively Conservative problem. The same concerns were around under ...
First of all, let's look at what Nick Clegg actually said when he came up to Scotland yesterday: "I would describe myself as a devolutionist, someone who believes in a strong Scotland, in a strong United Kingdom, but where Scotland increasingly takes on more and more of its own powers and responsibilities."All the evidence suggests that is the mainstream of opinion and the extremists are those who either think that we need to yank Scotland out of the United Kingdom tomorrow, or those who say there should be no further change at all," Mr Clegg said."Well, I don't agree with ...
One of the things about visiting family is that I am simultaneously inside, and outside, of my comfort zone. Inside, because I am with my family, and outside, because I tend to find myself doing things that I might not otherwise do. My second cousins, Dylan and Arlene, are somewhat younger than I am, and are incredibly social. So, when cousins are in town, they are keen to do things. And, for some reason, if there's karaoke involved, all the better.We had been part of a shopping exhibition to Phoenix Mills, a rather chi-chi mall in Lower Parel, and the ...
Mike German, former leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats, is co-chair of the Parliamentary Party Committee on Work and Pensions. He writes in Liberal Democrat Voice of a big first step being taken towards Liberal Democrats' long term ambition of merging tax and benefits. The Welfare Reform Bill is now in the final stages of its passage through the House of Lords and Mike explains his significance: Our benefit system is the most complex and cumbersome system in the developed world. It requires an annual book to be published which explains the system and is the size of the Bible! ...
This lovely parallel was used earlier in the week to illustrate a tremendous story of courage – the multilateral intervention force sent into Guatemala. A force of lawyers and law enforcers rather than the military, for a change. Read about it here.
There's no prize at stake - just the opportunity to prove you're wittier than any other LDV reader... (Hat-tip to the Colchester Daily Gazette.) Here's veteran Lib Dem MP for Colchester Sir Bob Russell, knighted for public service in this year's honours, enjoying a frame of snooker with Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg. What do you think might be being said or thought by or about those pictured? And the winner of our last caption comp is... Some fantastic entries for our most recent caption competition, Jeremy Browne "it's not always this black-and-white" Edition. The winner, according to The Voice's ...
It is good news that Nick Clegg is going to use his deputy-priministerial status to "do something" about the excesses of executive pay, and the signs are that David Cameron is, at least vaguely, "on side" on the issue. Unfortunately the most likely option is to put an employee representative, or maybe representatives, on remuneration boards. This sounds more like an unprotected little toe rather than a steel-toecapped boot. Certainly one employee representative will not be enough. Two would be better, but even they would need substantial back-up to produce arguments based on research and evidence in addition to moral ...
Back in 2004 I had a look at the maths around the application of the Twelfth Amendment to the US Constitution, in case neither Presidential candidate (Bush jr and Kerry on that occasion) managed to clear 270 votes in the Electoral College. As you know, Bob, in that case the delegation of each state in the House of Representatives gets to cast a single block vote for the election of the President, and repeats this until one candidate gets a majority (ie 26 of the 50). The maths in 2004 were bad for Kerry (as was much else). By my ...
it's not very often I feel the need to take on blogging about football, generally leaving that to people with a better understanding of the beautiful game, but I've felt very strongly recently about the actions of the football club and indeed Luis Suarez as an extension. After last nights drubbing of Oldham, where young Tom Adyemi was racially abused by Liverpool fans wearing Suarez shirts. It highlighted a strong moral hazard had been created. Liverpool should face the full extent of the law for allowing it to happen. Moments after the Man Utd vs Liverpool game that has proved ...
...It depends which paper you read. If you read the Guardian, you'll see that 28th December was a record-breaking day for wind turbines in the UK, with 12.2% of our energy demand being produced by the twirly things. This was a beneficial side-effect of all the weather we've been having recently. But if you read the Mail you'll be treated, for the nth time, to the photo of flames flying out from the Ardrossan wind turbines and a headline saying that our wind turbines "can't cope with UK weather as 3 more blown to pieces". That's three out of 3,515, ...
Over the last four years we've allocated a lot of local resources towards crime prevention. Things like providing free property marking kit, Alertboxes, etc. Our latest work is to encourage people to contact the local East Dulwich ward Safer Neighbourhood Team and report all crime that occurs and alert criminals that most of East Dulwich has Neighbourhood Watch coverage – hopefully you've noticed the new signage poping up all over the area?
Last year, I suggested that TfL should use QR codes to point to their excellent mobile countdown service. Looks like someone was listening! I spotted this poster at a tube station. [IMG: TfL QR Poster] Nestled in the corner is a QR code pointing at the mobile bus countdown service! [IMG: TfL QR Detail] This is a close-to-perfect use of QR. Points to a mobile site. Easy to scan code. Good call to action. As I suggested in my original post, TfL could customise the code, or print a separate one for each bus stop. This is, however, an excellent ...
To mark the start of 2012, we're running a series of posts over consecutive days on the main challenges for the Liberal Democrats in 2012. I've already written about the four priorities for the party's new Chief Executive, Tim Gordon, but as the Liberal Democrats are more than just the one man whilst he has four, this series sets out six for the party. Quite simply, too many Liberal Democrat ministers have too low a profile. If low profiles came despite working hard to get coverage and to communicate, that might be excusable. After all, that was the fate of ...
The official figures for Disability Living Allowance fraud is 0.5%. The government want to cut 20% from the disability bill. They plan to do this by abolishing DLA and making eligability for its replacement, PIP, harder. That does not mean there are fewer disabled people, just fewer who will get the help they need. A new report will be coming out on Monday which will reveal the results of FOI requests to find out about the responses to the government consultation on the plans to scrap DLA and replace it with "PIP". The reason FOI requests are necessary is because ...
Liberal Democrat candidate for London Mayor, Brian Paddick, has a new Twitter account to back-up his cross-London listening exercise: @BrianListening. You can follow the Liberal Democrat GLA members and candidates, including this new account, in one place via the list twitter.com/markpack/london-assembly.
Just a quick reminder; if you have a child born between 1st September 2007 and 31st August 2008 that they need to apply to the school they wish their child to attend from September 2012. The deadline for applications is the 15th January (next Sunday). The process can be completed online at www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/admissions or by returning a paper form, which can be obtained from any primary school and returned to the Admissions Team at Cambridgeshire County Council. Alternatively you can pick up the form from Bar Hill Primary.
Just a quick reminder; if you have a child born between 1st September 2007 and 31st August 2008 that they need to apply to the school they wish their child to attend from September 2012. The deadline for applications is the 15th January (next Sunday). The process can be completed online at www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/admissions or by returning a paper form, which can be obtained from any primary school and returned to the Admissions Team at Cambridgeshire County Council. Alternatively you can pick up the form from either King's Hedges Primary or the Grove.
Cllr Shona Johnstone has recently reported back to all County Councillors that the Overview and Scrutiny Management Group has recently concluded it's review of public participation in the Overview and Scrutiny process and published a document regarding Public Speaking at Overview and Scrutiny meetings. There is a lot in this document that's good. It does tend (slightly) towards the overly bureaucratic - I have yet to attend an Overview and Scrutiny meeting where a member of the public raising their hand in the public gallery and being called by the Chair wouldn't have been a sufficient notification for public speaking ...
The other day - for no apparent reason - a certain Sophie Ellis-Bextor popped into my head. Naturally my second thought - after wondering where she had come from - was to ear-mark the song in question for this blog-spot. So, without further ado, here is the lady in question: Andrew
I have taken a close interest in the possibility of local television for Dundee, Tayside and North Fife and it was therefore good to see the positive news for Dundee following the recent announcement of areas to be licensed for local TV services. News on national TV and in the national press on the day of the announcement concentrated on only Edinburgh and Glasgow. There was a general failure to report that there are, in fact, two lists of locations and the second of these lists includes the location identified as Dundee. This is served by the Angus transmitter which ...
Day 6 In your own space, rec at least 3 fanworks you thought you wouldn't like (because they weren't your fandom or they pushed against your boundaries or you thought you just wouldn't be interested) and that you ended up loving. All of these fall under "not my fandom", and the last one pushes a couple of boundaries: Children of the Wanderers (Rock of Ages translation by [IMG: [personal profile] ] cosmic_tuesdays - Supernatural AU, gen, some violence. Dreaming On by Elfwreck - Changeling: the Dreaming, gen. Ever So Much More Than Twenty by the_alchemist - Peter Pan, Adult!Wendy/Hook, mention ...
Sorry for the non-appearance of the last part of Doctor Watson. I've been having stress-related brain freezes the last few days, and have basically been unable to get anything done either at work or at home. I've also been trying to recover data from a 2TB hard drive which developed, almost overnight, several thousand bad ...
With the GOP nomination contest heading towards two defining primaries in South Carolina and Florida later this month - informed insight is in short supply this side of the pond as seen by the fairly superficial beeb coverage. And it was the beeb afterall who thought 2010 election night in the UK was enhanced by Andrew Neil and drunken vacuous celebs on a boat in the Thames. Anyway I came across this wonderful publication earlier - which has the sort of knowledgable insider view of campaigning and elections that is sadly lacking in the UK (about both here and overseas). ...
