Embed from Getty Images We have, because Nick Harvey won North Devon back from the Tories in 1992 and held it until the debacle of 2015. But there were promising signs even before Nick was elected. I am reminded of one of the first pieces I ever wrote for Liberal Democrat News - a review of the register of MPs' interests, which appeared in the edition of 17 May 1996. It was all a long time ago: Alex Carlile was still an MP and still a Liberal Democrat. I wrote of him: Alex Carlile is another hard-working member, including among ...
Liberal Democrat members in Wells constituency have just voted for their new Prospective Parliamentary Candidate (PPC). From a shortlist of three, they picked the former MP for the seat, Tessa Munt.
Its worth remembering that everytime Lord Digby Jones is wheeled out as one of the very few "voices of industry" in favour of #brexit... ...he was never actually in Industry. He was a Lawyer, then joined CBI as a administrateor & spokesperson when he couldnt get higher in law.— Nick🇬🇧🇪🇺 (@nicktolhurst) June 2, 2018 I saw this tweet the other day and it turns out to be true. Over to Wikipedia and its entry for Digby Jones, Baron Jones of Birmingham: Born in Birmingham, Jones was educated at Bromsgrove School where he was Head Boy, and read Law at University ...
Current Gemini, by Dorothy Dunnett Six Wakes, by Mur Lafferty Stories of the Maksura, by Martha Wells Last books finished A Lit Fuse: The Provocative Life of Harlan Ellison, by Nat Segaloff (extract) The Collapsing Empire, by John Scalzi Raven Stratagem, by Yoon Ha Lee Penric's Fox, by Lois McMaster Bujold Next books Dark Matter, by Blake Crouch Ghana Must Go, by Taiye Selasie
I've been mulling over for a while blogging about an oft used phrase "makes me ashamed to be British (or English)". As usual Nigel Farage has tipped me over the edge. The BBC has a survey about attitudes towards Englishness in which it appears that young people are likely to be less proud of being English than older people. The BBC then approaches its man for all comments, Nigel Farage, who says "It's as if we're teaching young people that any sense of English identity is racist." In the replies below the Beeb's tweet about it, several people say Farage ...
A new zonal fares system is being proposed for Metrolink. The proposal would replace the existing 'station to station' fare system with a zonal system - similar to London's travel network. You have the opportunity to share your feedback ahead of any final decision being made about the proposed change with a survey before 17 June. Take the survey here. According to T4GM, the proposal would make using Metrolink simpler, more convenient and better value for money. The proposal for Metrolink would introduce four ringed zones on the network. Prestwich and Heaton Park stations are in Zone 3. Besses is ...
1st – 7th June is National Volunteers' Week 2018. Volunteers' Week is a time to say thank you for the fantastic contribution volunteers make. During the week, hundreds of events and celebrations take place across the country, saying thank you to volunteers and recognising their invaluable and diverse contribution to the UK. This information is from Volunteering England: "Here you'll find inspiring volunteering stories, ways to get involved in the week, and free downloadable resources to help make your celebrations a success". The campaign was established in 1984 by Volunteering England, which merged with NCVO in 2013. NCVO now leads ...
The searchable map of roadworks in Prestwich during April extends to a full five pages this month on the GM Roadworks Website (www.gmroadworks.org) The major roadworks in June areare: – Heywood Road – continuing British Gas (Cadent) works in various places right through to next year. – Hilton Lane – one way signals for resurfacing and a road closure for 1 day at at the junction of Butterstile Lane. – Bury New Road – BT lane closure and traffic lights at the junction of Kingswood Road 23-24 June (no entry into Kingswood from BNR). – United Utilities road closures on ...
This post will cover how to participate in debates - including speaking and voting - and some of how chairs plan them, and will explain why some seemingly arcane things happen1. There are several different kinds of debates that can happen at conference, but for the purposes of this post there is not much difference between a policy motion and a business motion and a constitutional amendment2. What you need to do before the debateRead the motion. You probably want to do this before even arriving at conference, really. If there is to be a debate on a topic you ...
Anyone who lives or travels anywhere near Heaton Park will no doubt be aware that the Parklife Festival is this weekend (Saturday 9 and Sunday 10 June 2018). The live event is 11am-11pm both days. Please note: – Road closures – e.g. Sheepfoot Lane plus other no waiting restrictions. Whittaker Lane is open but not from the Bury Old Road end. – Sound checks from 4pm on Friday and 10am on Saturday and Sunday. – Contact information for residents is: residents@parklife.uk.com Full copy of the residents information leaflet here.
This post is going to cover both the timing of conference, and the timings within conference. I'm not going to be using technical definitions of things here - for example technically, the fringe is not part of conference1, but I'm just going to refer to the entire event as "conference" - in hopes of being understandable and not descending into jargon. As always I welcome questions in the comments. The Timing of Conferences Spring Conference is usually half way through March, normally the second but sometimes the third weekend in the month. It lasts for a weekend, normally having a ...
Mon 4th
15:51
Just how "socialist" are Corbyn, his followers and his policies? And how much should that worry us a...
Corbyn, like the rest of the current British hard left, presents himself as incredibly radical at times, yet at others as essentially moderate in approach, depending on the intended audience. He gets away with this in much the same way Donald Trump manages to land his wild vacillations: by throwing everything at the public so fast and so full of conviction each time, with no hint that a recently held position may have just been grossly contradicted, that rebuttal becomes difficult. Difficult, but not impossible. Corbyn has never personally described his politics as anything other than as socialist, throughout his ...
Last week, I was less than entirely complimentary about FIRC. This week, perhaps I should try to be more... helpful. So, having raised the question of communication, and being fairly confident that the Committee's Chair and Secretary may look in on the comments, here's an opportunity for you to make some suggestions as to how we, as a Committee, might engage with you all. First, though, here's an excerpt from the Federal Constitution, just to make it clear what we do, and what we do not... There shall be a Federal International Relations Committee ("FIRC") which shall be responsible to ...
Spurriers Lane has to date been known for one good thing (the Carla Lane Animals in Need Sanctuary – see 1st photo below) and one bad thing (it suffers from huge amounts of fly-tipping* – see 2nd photo below) but are things going to change in an even more controversial way because of a planning application before Sefton Council's planning Committee for a travellers permanent site? I understand that the planning application is going to be discussed in public at a meeting of Melling Parish Council on Tuesday 12th June at 7.30pm in Melling Primary School. Here's a link to ...
It was quite a long meeting, but a lot of it was taken up with stuff I can't blog about: future venues and financial stuff. The headline news is: we have a new chair, as you may have already seen on Lib Dem Voice. This also means we have a new vice chair, since Geoff has gone up a rung. I was on the losing side of both elections, having nominated and voted for Zoe O'Connell to be chair and Mary Reid to be Vice Chair, but I'm not sore about it. I'm very fond indeed of our new Vice ...
Responding to Sajid Javid's pledge to re-assess immigration caps, Liberal Democrat Home Affair's Spokesperson Ed Davey said: "The Home Secretary will have the support of almost everyone in Parliament to exclude students and medical staff from the immigration cap, but it's far from clear that the Prime Minister is willing to admit her long cherished policy is wrong. I hope Parliament can get to vote on this as soon as possible."If the new Home Secretary is going to make a genuine change from the policies of Theresa May and Amber Rudd, his changes to the immigration cap need to go ...
Like most Liberal Democrats I opposed the introduction of Police & Crime Commissioners, and I still do. I would support abolishing them and returning the governance of our local police constabularies to boards of elected councillors. In Gloucestershire where we have co-terminus boundaries with the county's constabulary we could be even more radical and hand back the governance of police to Gloucestershire County Council. Under this government we know major governance changes won't happen and that in 2020 we shall have elections for the PCCs in England and Wales. In 2016 Liberal Democrats only stood candidates in 30 out of ...
Crowdfunding platform suspends campaign to distribute 'deceitful' school resources on transgender young people Hurrah! Private schools 'abuse charity status' by giving discounts to richer families Have long thought that private schools should be taxed as businesses, not charities. This does nothing to change that view. UK £615M worse off per week under preferred Brexit scenario: study A reminder of this. Anger as wheelchair users left unable to ride trains on major route Somebody needs to sue TPE over this. From Facebook to Amazon, these are the default privacy settings you should change OfC several of these are not relevant to ...
Sun, 12:56: How One Woman's Fight to Save Her Family Helped Lead to a Mass Exoneration https://t.co/n9F0zet5Xw The appalling ra... https://t.co/8rtXqZ49s4 Sun, 15:03: Looking For JJ, by Anne Cassidy https://t.co/7t8Bxo1pWR Sun, 15:15: RT @damonwake: There is a Tintin frame for almost every conceivable Brexit occasion. https://t.co/YsPZyM1S0I Sun, 16:05: RT @stephenkb: Good news! The government has abandoned science fiction solutions to the Irish border. Bad news! They've embraced magical re... Sun, 20:48: RT @djmgaffneyw4: Post-buffergate, this is starting to feel more like the beginning of the end than the end of the beginning. https://t.co/... Mon, 09:59: RT @GaryBurgessCI: A beauty in ...
Geoff Payne has been elected as the new Chair of Federal Conference Committee (FCC). Geoff served as Vice-Chair of the committee for eight years and was responsible for chairs' training, access arrangements and the initial selection of venues and setting of registration rates. He was also a long-standing member of the Federal Policy Committee. The election for chair followed the decision of long-serving former chair, Andrew Wiseman, to step down. Andrew was a highly popular chair of FCC and steered party conference through a period of great change including the coalition years. Everyone on FCC has paid tribute to his ...
Like most others, I have enjoyed "A Very English Scandal" on BBC1. It's been a really superbly-made series. What packed more of a punch, for me, was "The Jeremy Thorpe scandal", Tom Mangold's updated documentary, shown on BBC4 on Sunday night. Having watched that, as a matter of conscience, I find it disturbing that the ... Continue reading Time for the party to apologise to Norman Scott
Government schemes to try to reconcile the impossible conundrum of the UK leaving the single market whilst at the same time maintaining a seamless, tariff-free border between Northern Ireland the Irish Republic, have been coming at us thick and fast in recent weeks. All of them are unworkable, none of them have proved to be acceptable to the EU, whilst many of them have the air of a Heath Robinson contraption, drawn up on the back of a Portcullis House napkin without once consulting with the people charged with making the arrangement work. And so the latest, so-called solution has ...
The euro is stuck in purgatory. Heaven seems ever further away. And with the Italian political crisis, hell seems closer than ever. In the past, I have called the introduction of the euro the most destructive political act since World War II. The flawed architecture on which the euro was built was there for all [...] The post How the euro became an instrument of division appeared first on Radix.
Alternatively, why paint guidance markings for a cycle path so that cyclists can't actually use the path because there's a lamp post in the middle of it? The following photos have been sent to Highways England who are responsible for Switch Island in the hope that they will consider addressing the error of their ways. You see it's not just vehicles that are led a merry dance around this infamous traffic island/junction.
Mon 4th
08:00
The railway ticketing and fares consultation is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to change fares f...
The rail industry has launched a consultation it claims will deliver 'root and branch' reform of fare regulations that date back to the mid-1990s. For customers, this represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to change ticketing and fares that we must seize. A say for passengers in the tickets they buy to get them to school, to work, to an apprenticeship, to university, or to see family and friends, is long overdue. The fares system we endure today was established by John Major's Government in 1995, and years of franchising agreements have added layers of complexity to the system. The result: passengers ...
Mon 4th
07:25Welcome to my day: 4 June 2018 - as you near your destination, the more Brexit's slip, sliding away?
So, it's apparently possible that we'll be reduced to hunting and grazing off of the land within weeks of Brexit, if the Sunday Times is to be believed. I suppose that, as Chair of my Parish Council, I'll be organising bands of villagers, armed to the teeth, to keep you away from our food supplies... But seriously, whilst the scenario supposedly outlined may be exaggerated for effect, it is a reminder that, in a world of interdependencies, no country is an island, even when it consists of nothing else. But, of course, no government could ever allow things to come ...
DUNDEE CITY COUNCIL - WEEKLY ROAD REPORT REPORT FOR WEST END WARD - WEEK COMMENCING MONDAY 4 JUNE 2018 South Union Street/South Marketgait at Dundee Railway Station - northbound nearside lane closure from 9.30am for 4 weeks for footway works. Forthcoming Roadworks Riverside Approach - prohibition of right turn into Riverside Approach from Riverside Drive from Monday 11 June for 5 days for SGN investigation work.
