Matt Kennard reminds us of Tony Blair's friendly relations with Vladimir Putin: "The close relationship between the UK prime minister and Russian president began ... when Blair made a whistle-stop visit to St Petersburg to help Putin get elected in Russia's upcoming presidential election. " "Bunting notes that William Beveridge, original architect of the British welfare state, envisioned a role for 'friendly societies' - non-governmental providers - for the provision of healthcare. But this was a road not taken. Instead, a highly centralised national health service prevailed, which adopted a medicalised approach to care, valuing technical expertise over human values." ...
After 6 years of consultations, draft bills, more consultations and, finally, 3 days of debate with over 150 amendments, the Scottish Parliament passed the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill by 86 votes to 39. The Conservatives opposed the Bill, although two of their MSPs voted for it. There were 9 SNP and 2 Labour rebels opposing it. That must be one of the biggest, if not the biggest, SNP rebellions ever. Although the debate was often fractious, there was a lot of cross-party working on amendments to develop consensus. Here's Scottish Lib Dem Leader Alex Cole-Hamilton speaking in the debate: ...
In the Independent a couple of weeks ago, Jamie Stone, the Liberal Democrat MP for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross, regaled us with a tale of being a pantomime dame in the Scottish Highlands town of Tain. This appears to be something on a habit. He played Dame Tilly Trott in Jack and the Beanstalk just before an election in 2017. He was elected regardless, despite the wardrobe difficulties: "I had to haul myself into a massive bra and fake boobs, the wig, the tights, the boots." He suffered the age-old struggle to learn lines: "But you speak every week ...
Thu 22nd
16:48
Mum addicted to tattoos 'forced to watch her children's school play through the window'
Congratulations to Wales Online for winning our Headline of the Day Award with his seasonal effort. As the judges remarked, it's not a case of "No room at the inn" so much as one of "You're barred". But didn't the multitude of the heavenly host say "Good will to all men - and women too, if you want to get all woke about it"? Our Religious Affairs correspondent replies: In a very real sense.
Bridgnorth Cliff Railway has been forced to close. perhaps until Easter, because of the condition of a wall on a neighbouring property owned by the town council. Dr Malvern Tipping, the director of the railway, told the Shropshire Star: "There will be two effects: on local passengers who use the service every day to go to work or the shops - although a lot stay at home more as a result of the pandemic - and to tourists. "We've had a big boost in passenger travel from tourists, so this will create a big problem if they are now disinclined ...
The Independent reports that Home office emails have reported that more than 400 asylum seekers were illegally detained at immigration removal centres. They say that the emails descibe the detention of between 450 and 500 migrants held as "overflow" from the Manston processing centre in November as "no longer legal". They add that During a surge in Channel crossings in October, as many as 4,000 people were being detained at Manston, which is designed to hold just 1,600: New arrivals were expected to be taken to the centre, which is designed for holding people for short periods during security and ...
Role of autophagy in aging: The good, the bad, and the ugly is a really good review into the function of autophagy (eating yourself) which is how cells tidy themselves up by getting rid of dysfunctional mitochondria and creating new ones. Autophagy is a good thing because it makes cells work better. That almost certainly ups the Acetyl-CoA levels in the nucleus which readers of this blog will
For many Ukrainians, this year's Christmas will be held by candlelight Volodymyr Zelenskyy told Congress yesterday. In what may have been his first outing outside Ukraine since the war started 300 days before, Zelenskyy didn't don a suit for the occasion. Ever the role player, he turned up on Capitol Hill wearing his signature khaki fatigues. I watched President Zelenskyy's speech to Congress in the early hours (UK time). I couldn't help welling up at times. Here was a man once dismissed as a comedian that once pretended to be a president and incredulously became the real thing. Now he ...
Scottish leader Alex Cole-Hamilton has posted the following explaining why all the Liberal Democrat MSPs have been voting in favour of the Gender Recognition Reform Bill: At the conclusion of Stage 3 proceedings, all of our Scottish Liberal Democrat MSPs will vote for the Gender Recognition Reform Bill in the Scottish Parliament. It was a commitment in our election manifestos for the past two Holyrood elections, it honours party policy made by our conference and it is the right thing to do. We support reform because we believe the prolonged and intrusive medicalised approach currently in place can cause trauma ...
This is a 19th-century German carol by the composer Peter Cornelius. It became increasingly popular in Britain as the 20th century progressed. It was the only slightly unusual track on the album of carols that the family owned when I was a child, and it reminds me of a late winter afternoon at Hemel Hempstead School where, aged 12, I was taking part in a play with songs, put on by pupils from the first two years. As we left the rehearsal, somewhere else in the building the school choir was practising this piece. Our play, incidentally, was The Charcoal-Burners' ...
Further to the West End Open Doors information we posted earlier this week, local libraries including our own at Blackness Library welcome all residents - contact details below. Please note community libraries close over the Christmas and New Year period - details at www.leisureandculturedundee.com/opening-hours
