LibDem Blogs - Archived!

I was going to post today about my trip to Amsterdam, but as I logged on to the Internet I heard the news about London. Unsurprisingly my mind has been frequently in a different place since. I cannot, and do not want to, comprehend the mindset that can cause such carnage. These murderers pray on fear, and Richard is exactly right when he says that we have to continue as normal, for otherwise we are allowing the fear-mongers to win. Having been at the Dutch Resistance Museum today, one point really came home to me. The exhibition starts off with ...

A day I will never forget, as bombs rocked the North, West and East of Central London. Thankfully, none of my family and friends were caught in the blasts (although seeing Kings Cross as it was today bought a chill to my spine). My heart goes out to those who lost loved ones today. Never give up, never surrender to those that wish to destroy our lives. The greatest thing we can do now, is to

The bombings in London today were of course terrible, and we should all spare a thought for those caught up in them. However, we must now be on our guard against inappropriate knee-jerk reactions. We should think very carefully about why people were motivated to do this and consider our response carefully. Now the consequences of [...]

I have been at home today in London and so well away from the horrific events on the Tube trains and bus. The day has been spent calling and being called by friends and family to check that everyone is OK. I guess we will only be sure that nobody we know has been affected [...]

This is not a news site so I will not attempt to do what others can do better. I have been keeping abreast of the awful news from London all day. It seems that each time I return to it the number of casualties has risen. My helplessness is encapsulated by the fact that there is nothing I can say that will undo what has been done or that will help anybody come to terms with it. The one thing I am having difficulty with is the way that television journalists in particular are filling in the gaps in their ...

It has been a difficult day. I narrrowly missed being on the Hammersmith & City line train that was hit by the bomb at Edgware Road Tube. I usually take that train, but today I picked up the Bakerloo line train at Paddington. On such small things, great things may rest. The Police are now saying that 9 people were killed at Edgware Road. I had an uneventful journey, although there was talk of power failures. Of course now we know the dreadful truth. It was a quiet day - except for the sirens. As write, the buses have been ...

I'm listening to Ralph McTell's 'Streets of London', which Ken introduced me to a few months ago. I wanted to break my self-imposed break from blogging to offer some thoughts after the blast in London today. The most moving image of the day, for me, was the BBC interview with an old World War II veteran, who had been on the way to a reunion with other old soldiers, when he was caught up in the attacks. He simply said, nonchalantly, "well, we've been through it before, haven't we?" The key response of London and the whole of Britain must ...

I have already said on this blog that my comment about Leighton Andrews being the "middle class member for Rhondda" was a tad unfair, though a perfectly valid debating point at the time. Leighton however, seems to have taken it to heart and has allegedly spent the last two weeks muttering darkly under his breath about me.What has apparently added to his anger is an article in the South Wales Evening Post the following week in which the paper's political editor gave a blow-by-blow account of the exchange. The section that gave most offence was the reference to Leighton's wife ...

The growth of blogging has seen a large number of political sites emerge. There are some such as this one, where an elected representative seeks to offer an insight into the political process, comment on current events and establish a dialogue with his or her constituents. There are others that shadow elected members, reporting on their actions, their speeches and their public appearances. And of course there are the sites set up to watch the activities of an individual political party. A 'watch' site is currently established for Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the UKIP. The Tory one has fallen ...

Watching the appalling news from London, the cynic in me wonders how long the Government will manage to stave off the irresistible urge to say, with no consideration of the evidence, “It wouldn’t have happened if we’d had ID cards.” Mercifully few fatalities reported so far, given the number of incidents and scale of the [...]

Some thought President Chirac might like to consider next time he fancies dissing another nation’s cuisine. The final IOC vote was London 54, Paris 50. A majority of four can be lost by two votes switching. Had there been a tie at 52-52, Jacques Rogge, the IOC President, had a casting vote. Although we don’t know how he would’ve [...]

From The London Web Site Mayor of London Ken Livingstone has issued the following statement: 'London has been the target of a cowardly terrorist attack. Londoners have responded calmly and courageously. 'I commend the professionalism, courage of the Metropolitan Police, Transport for London staff, the Ambulance, Fire and other emergency services. 'On behalf of all Londoners, I want to express

I had a number of things I was going to say on this blog today but at the moment I am still a bit stunned at the bombing outrage in London. It is likely that I will post on other matters later but for now I am still trying to come to terms with the impact of these terrorist attacks on the lives of all those affected. My thoughts are with the victims, their families and their friends. Update: A website has been created on which you can record a personal tribute to the victims of these terrorist acts. ...

I'm back at home, shaking and thinking about what could have happened if I had tried to catch the earlier train. Of course, my story is only one of inconvenience, and nothing compared to the tragedies that are being revealed, moment by ghastly moment. I was planning to catch the 10am train from Kings Cross to Harrogate, where I was to speak about e-democracy at an evening fringe meeting at the Local Government Association's annual conference. I changed my mind at the last minute and aimed for the 11am. When I picked up a train ...

It seems that the mobile network (tmobile) has seized up as has the landline network from parliament to the outside world. (I cannot phone my London office to check that everyone is OK.) The odd thing is that this link to the net (via Vodafone) is clearly still working otherwise this entry would not be on the blog.

I was in the press gallery when the incidents initially described as a power surge started being reported. Sadly it does appear to have been some form of terror incident probably linked to the commencement of G8 (much more likely than something linked to the Olympics). Terror incidents are always particularly sad as they generally increase anger in the world and it is very difficult to take

The European Parliament yesterday voted massively to reject the Directive on Computer-Implemented Inventions. This Directive set out to create a common European definition for when computer software can and cannot be patented. It provoked a very fierce debate becoming perhaps the most high profile technical issue we have seen come before a Parliamentary body. [...]

Chevron launched http://www.willyoujoinus.com/ on Tuesday 5th July. This is an energy awareness campaign. They make no prediction as to when global supply will peak, they merely recognise the problem. The big difficulty with predicting when it will peak is that there will only be certainty a few years afterwards. It is, therefore, difficult to be precise. Colin Campbell makes a prediction in his

A strain of avian flu has been killing wild geese in western China. Geese are migratory birds, and epidemiologists fear that the infection may break into wider circulation from Asia carried by infected geese. So far human deaths have been caused only when people work in close proximity to birds, such as in markets where live poultry are kept. But scientists are worried that avian flu will