Three principal authority council by-elections this week, and a full slate of Liberal Democrat candidates – which is one up on last time, hooray. Double hooray, in fact, because that ward which didn't have a Lib Dem last time but did this time now has a Liberal Democrat councillor: Wooton Bridge (Isle of Wight) Council By-Election Result: LDM: 47.9% (New) CON: 29.3% (-2.5) VEC: 17.9% (-29.4) GRN: 4.8% (-8.7) No IND (-7.4) as previous. VEC = Vectis (Localist Party) Liberal Democrat GAIN from Localists. Changes w/ 2021. — Election Maps UK (@ElectionMapsUK) August 24, 2023
BBC4 is currently repeating the wonderful 1976 dramatisation of Robert Graves' I, Claudius on Wednesday evenings, three episodes at at time. The first six are now up on iPlayer. I've been staying up to watch them because they are so good and also because watching them now reminds me of watching them when I was a teenager. It's a way of pretending I'm still young. Yesterday I discovered a video called The Epic That Never Was. It's a 1965 documentary about an earlier, abortive attempt to adapt I, Claudius for the screen. This was a British film that began shooting ...
"Last year the large tortoiseshell butterfly, thought to be extinct in the UK, formed a breeding colony at Knepp. The estate is also home to all of the UK's five owl species, 13 of its 17 bat species and breeding populations of a dozen birds on the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds' Conservation Concern Red List." Elizabeth Fitt talks to Isabella Tree about the rewilding of the Knepp Estate in West Sussex. David Rowland challenges the way the we are rapidly coming to expect to pay for our healthcare: "Remember the infamous law which mandated that people should ...
We experience time in a linear way. We move through time at a uniform speed and in a single direction. We can't slow it down. And we can't (yet) go back. Once time has passed us by, that's it. Time is also, from our perspective, finite. As Oliver Burkeman observes in his book Four thousand weeks, the average human lifetime spans, well, four thousand weeks. That might sound like a lot, but it really isn't. Especially if, like me, you're probably about half-way through your temporal allowance. Consequently, the way in which I spend my time is of considerable importance ...
Embed from Getty ImagesAnne Applebaum writes for The Atlantic about the mood in Putin's Russia following the murder of Yevgeny Prigozhin: Everyone who is still part of the inner circle already hires bodyguards and, if they can, sends their family abroad. Those who can afford it already have private armies. Anyone associated with Prigozhin now has new reasons to fear for their safety too. One general close to Prigozhin was relieved of his command today. He had not been seen in public for many weeks. Prigozhin's deputy, Dmitry Utkin, died today on the plane along with him. Applebaum points out ...
You may just have heard that Ed Maxfield and I have written a book, now on to its third edition, about how elections are won. If you've not yet read it, here are six reasons to give it a whirl...
The rate of inflation may be falling, that is prices are not rising as quickly, but hidden behind the headline figures are some stark facts that underline the cost of living crisis in this country. The Mirror reports on research by the Liberal Democrats that has found that the cost of a typical weekly shop has soared by a mammoth 37% in the past two years. The paper says that new figures show that a loaf of bread has gone up by 37p, while a pint of milk is now 24p more expensive than in 2021 - a 57% rise. ...
Our party's calls for Nadine Dorries to do something – anything – have been getting more strident. To recap, on Friday 9th June she said she was resigning from Parliament, with immediate effect, mainly in a huff because her promised peerage in Johnson's Resignation Honours had been blocked. But then she didn't – resign, that is. Instead she said that she was waiting for an explanation of why her appointment was blocked. In the meantime there are claims that she has been absent both from the House and from her constituency of Mid Bedfordshire. Dorries herself claimed yesterday that she ...
Michael's surgeries take place today and every Thursday during school term time. They are as follows : Thursdays at 5.45pm prompt - West End Campus (come to reception area of St Joseph's RC and Victoria Park Primary Schools) Thursdays at 6.30pm prompt - Harris Academy reception area All welcome - no appointment necessary!
As mentioned in an article 'Social Justice from a Pagan Perspective' by Gus diZerega, states that taken in its broadest sense, liberalism is the contemporary political philosophy in greatest harmony with a modern Pagan outlook. Liberalism's core ethical insight is that individuals are the fundamental moral units within society, and all individuals are equally so. [...]
