How many places do you visit in one day nowadays? I visit one place – the local shop. I am not a hermit. I do venture out further afield at weekends to see friends normally at a cafe or restaurant in Central London. The photo is of me on an overground train going into London ... The post I have forgotten life pre-pandemic appeared first on A Midlifer in London .
Wed 18th
21:15
Dick Newby slams Government over "casual" and "exruciatingly complacent" approach to Afghanistan
Lib Dem Lords leader Dick Newby laid bare the Prime Minister's contradictory statements, a month apart, that there was "no path to victory for the Taliban" and that "this was the way we always knew it was going to go." While there were many questions to answer about the extent of our failures, he called for urgent, humanitarian action, again criticising the inadequacy of the Government's scheme. Opening for us in the Lords debate on Afghanistan @RichardNewby3 laments the complacency of the Prime Minister, and the 'casual' way the Government has overseen the final chapter of our latest involvement in ...
"We just live to exist and nothing else" Lib Dem Layla Moran reads the words of a woman in Afghanistan, before accusing PM Boris Johnson of being "complicit by his impotence" https://t.co/Aeo1BZw2tC pic.twitter.com/h2DsVMb41A — BBC Politics (@BBCPolitics) August 18, 2021 Lib Dem Foreign Affairs spokesperson Layla Moran spoke up for women and girls in today's debate, quoting a young Afghan woman who said "we just live to exist, nothing else." Daisy Cooper intervened to emphasise the point that the voices of Afghan women must be heard. Layla also slammed the Government's inadequate refugee plan, saying that it's barely 7 people ...
"I can't hold President Biden to account in this house, but I can hold our own government to account. I want to ask the PM, will he look our veterans and families of the fallen In the eye and tell them it was worth it now after his foreign policy catastrophe?"@EdwardJDavey pic.twitter.com/zVhs7QWy37 — Liberal Democrats (@LibDems) August 18, 2021 Ed Davey had a tough slot today, coming just after Tom Tugendhat's powerful speech. He did well, though. He laid bare Boris Johnson's share of the responsibility for what had happened: I cannot hold President Biden to account in this House, ...
The loss of World Heritage Status for our City, even though it was expected, is a huge blow to our international prestige and will, without a doubt, affect our tourism and inward investment. When, under Lib Dem control, we received the status in 2004 it helped our work, alongside winning the European Capital of Culture, in changing round the national and global and view of our City. Until these two things happened, we were just Beatles and Football globally and a poor man's version of Coronation Street within the UK. People shunned our City for visiting, living and investment and ...
This is the latest post in a series I started in late 2019, anticipating the twentieth anniversary of my bookblogging which will fall in 2023. Every six-ish days, I've been revisiting a month from my recent past, noting work and family developments as well as the books I read in that month. I've found it a pleasantly cathartic process, especially in recent circumstances. If you want to look back at previous entries, they are all tagged under bookblog nostalgia. September started for me with the seating of Loncon 3 as the winning bid for the 2014 Worldcon, without opposition, and ...
What happens at Lib Dem party conference? What's it like attending one for the first time? What are likely to be the big debates at this September's federal conference? With a special registration offer of just £1 for first time conference attendees, Cllr John Potter and the Lib Dem Pod team are hosting a special live show. Whether you've never come to conference before, or have been going for many decades, the show will have something for you. I'll be joining the panel along with Christine Jardine MP and conference committee member Mary Regnier-Wilson. The previous couple of live shows ...
Tue, 12:56: RT @ThatTimWalker: What Biden should have said. https://t.co/gL9iUdaLni Tue, 16:05: RT @KateWilton1: If you're going to constantly lie, at least synchronise your watches. https://t.co/Jq92Dkzer5 Tue, 17:11: RT @DamonLinker: Five Thesis on Afghanistan: 1. It's always possible to find things to criticize when events go worse than one might have... Tue, 17:51: Memo to future self: check fuel level in hired car *before* driving onto motorway. https://t.co/Rr0F6yhKc3 Tue, 18:33: Le dernier Atlas, tome 2, by Fabien Vehlmann, Gwen De Bonneval and Fred Blanchard https://t.co/srY1lKEwoj Wed, 10:45: Reader, he blocked me. He was expressing himself so inarticulately that I have ...
Wed 18th
09:04What can we expect the Lib Dems to say in today's Parliamentary debate on Afghanistan?
Parliament returns to day to spend five short hours debating the crisis in Afghanistan. What can we expect Liberal Democrats to be saying? The first priority is about getting people to safety. Yesterday, Layla Moran tweeted that we should be taking at least 20,000 refugees, a figure based on what we had called on for Syrians and what the Canadians had proposed. It's now or never to save innocent people from the Taliban's terror.@LibDems are calling for an immediate commitment to resettle at least 20k Afghan refugees in the UK. Priority should be those most at risk through an emergency ...
Reacting to figures released yesterday showing that UK's unemployment rate dropped to 4.7% in Q2 2021 (a decrease of 0.2% on the quarter before), Liberal Democrat Treasury Spokesperson Christine Jardine MP said: "These figures don't give us a real picture of what is going on in our economy or the scale of the challenge ahead. "The Government needs to listen to the businesses in the hospitality sector who cannot open up fully because staff were forced to move on during the lockdown. Or the countless small businesses who say they're months away from closing. And the parents worried how they ...
Residents have highlighted to me that the path from Saggar Street running along Pentland Crescent towards Pentland Avenue has the foliage from a rather overgrown tree causing an obstruction - see photo above. I have raised this with our local environment manager asking that the tree is trimmed back.
My recent information dump* on the deeply obscure historical novelist Vaughan Wilkins included the fact that the celebrated child actor Martin Stephens had appeared in a BBC radio adaptation of Wilkins' first novel And So - Victoria broadcast in 1962. Stephens had already given stunning film performances in both Village of the Damned and The Innocents. Though these films are more celebrated today than they were at the time, his presence in And So - Victoria suggests that the adaptation was a big deal. BBC Genome suggests he appeared in only one other radio play, while And So - Victoria ...
