I'm not sure this is the time to be declaring "Viva Palestine". Hamas is a terrorist organisation and Saturday's attacks were terrorism in action. That should not be a controversial statement. I cannot stand with Hamas, and I certainly cannot stand behind their actions. However, I am also uncomfortable at the initial responses of many other UK politicians - including the Prime Minister. Instinctively, their reaction has been to reiterate Israel's right to defend itself. Of course, Israel does have that right, but how helpful are these statements? Or those who have nothing to say other than "we stand with ...
Andrew Page thinks the media be overestimating the importance of Labour's victory in the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election. "When a child arrives in need of a placement it is a rush to the phones to find somewhere that can provide for the needs of that child and the net is cast far and wide across the country. As smaller providers are closing or being bought by larger concerns this very bespoke pool reduces and the sector can become a bidding war for any remaining places available." Chris Carubia, deputy leader of the Lib Dem group on Wirral Council, makes ...
The latest edition of my weekly political polling round-up, The Week in Polls, is out. As it says: A few years back I worked through all of the options available with a pollster and the relevant regulator over a polling question that presented as if it were true a false statement about a Liberal Democrat. I was politely rebuffed all the way down the line. Putting a false claim to someone in a poll, without even telling them after that it was false, was considered reasonable, acceptable and ethical. Find out more by reading this edition of The Week in ...
First, we had the Local Cycling and Walking Infrastructure Plan (LCWIP). Building on that, I published a Movement Strategy for Ludlow which went much further and included recommendations for walking, cycling, parking and bus improvements across the town. Now, Shropshire Council has begun work on a Future Transport and Movement Plan for Ludlow. This is being led by Shropshire Council's engineering consultants, WSP. The work by WSP has led to considerable improvements to the streetscape in Shrewsbury. Improvement works in Shifnal are nearing completion and plans for Bridgnorth are on the starting grid. It is time for Ludlow to see ...
One thing that we do know about Sunak is that he is no Donald Trump. He has the charisma of the wilting lettuce that outlived the Truss premiership. I cannot work out whether that is a good thing or a ... Continue reading →
It was with great sadness that I learnt of the death last week of Doreen Boyes. Doreen was Lib Dem Councillor for Pelaw and Heworth in Gateshead, serving her constituents from 2002 to 2011. After her retirement from the council, she was appointed an honorary alderman. Doreen was a great friend of the group both during her time as councillor and afterwards. She could always be counted on to give a
To a poor boy from the backstreets of Market Harborough who relied on Radio Luxemburg and Radio One for his music, Genesis's I Know What I Like (In Your Wardrobe) was like a song from another planet. It was a track from their 1973 album Selling England by the Pound and reached number 21 in the UK singles chart the following year. Your Own Special Way comes from 1976's Wind & Wuthering. It failed to trouble the top 40 in the UK, but it was a similarly minor hit in the US too. This is Genesis at a transitional stage. ...
There was welcome news in Rishi Sunak's announcements last week. There are many questions too. The welcome news from his announcement is that the £35bn that will be saved from axing HS2 north of Birmingham will not go into tax reductions or paying off some of the public debt but will be distributed around the country to fund roads, rail, and bus projects. Note the thinking there. Roads number one and rail number two. Buses are placed where they have always been, lagging at the end of sentences (and at the end of funding). Despite that, there may be money ...
United States The ripple effects following the ejection of Kevin McCarthy from the Speaker's chair in the US House of Representatives are severe and wide-reaching. The issues most affected are moderates in the Republican Party, Ukraine and the credibility of the United States. The mainstream of the Republican Party – or at least the congressional caucus – is not as unreasonably far-right as it is portrayed. Out of the 221 Republican members of the lower house, only 40 are signed up members of the right-wing Freedom Caucus. And of those, only about 20 could be considered extreme right by American ...
Rishi Sunak's wholesale retreat from the war on climate change is beginning to resemble Napoleon's ragged and humiliating flight from Moscow. In this case though, the casualties could be much greater as man-made changes in Earth's climate leads to poverty, famine, premature deaths and the possible near-extinction of the human race. The Prime Minister's latest wheeze, designed to appease backwoods Tories representing rural areas, is to restrict the installation of solar panels on swathes of English farmland, a proposal that climate campaigners say will raise bills and put the UK's energy security at risk. The Guardian reports that solar panels ...
We recently received complaints about badly overgrown foliage in Greenbank Place, including in the paths to the blocks of flats. We raised this with environment management at the City Council and were pleased to advise it was attended to promptly thereafter.
