LibDem Blogs - Archived!

Well, Well, Well. I thought this was a very confident performance from Charles albeit with a clearly supportive audience and some soft ball questions. Not being out shone by the Mega Wattage of Germaine Greer is quite an achievement. It also should be said that there are easier come back performances than Question Time. He must surely have been tempted by the GMTV sofa of Richard and Judys book club. However he must, must know that his " I wouldn't rule it out" response to the possibility of him comming back as Leader, will make (unhelpful) headlines. I notice ...

The Financial Times's Martin Wolf today turns his economist’s mind to analysing the risks of passive smoking, and challenges the authoritarian thinking which underpinned the recent legislation banning smoking in ‘public’ places: As a life-long non-smoker, I wonder what is driving these assaults. Is it an attempt to improve public health, as campaigners suggest? Or do smokers serve a need every

The ConHomies have voted for an oak tree as their new symbol. Were that to be adopted, which party will be the first to re-brand with a chainsaw?

Whenever someone proposes introducing Megan's Law to Britain, the case of the mob that attacked a paediatrician is sure to be mentioned by those who oppose the move. An article by Brendan O'Neill on the BBC website suggests that this story has grown a great deal in the telling. I am opposed to Megan's Law because it will make children any safer but will certainly make parents even more nervous and restrictive. But this whole debate does raise difficult questions for Liberals. Aren't we supposed to be on the side of transparency and the freedom of information?

What does it take to get a street drain unblocked? Opposite Tufnell Park tube station by the 390 bus stop on the Camden side of Brecknock Road, the street drain has been blocked with mud for months. It happened during the repairs to the mains water pipes. When it rains or pipes leak, there's nowhere for the water to drain off to, so the area fills up and overflows on to the pavement. The smell is quite offensive at times. Was very surprised that after all this time it has remained in this state. Last month ...

Ben Abbotts canvassing a couple of Cheeky Girls in Bromley.Beyond an antediluvian pun in the title, words fail me. Tags: liberal+democrats, bromley, ben+abbotts, cheeky+girls

Thank you for all your comments on Anne Atkins' little talk on Radio Four's 'Thought for the Day' yesterday. Please keep them coming. Below, I have attempted to rebut some of her points. The text of Ms Atkins’ speech is in italics, with my comments in bold. The BBC report of the result of the trial of the murderers of Jody Dobrowski is here. Hate crime is as hateful as the name suggests. Jody

From BBC News: Downing Street has promised a "full debate" on the future of the UK's independent nuclear weapons system. But Tony Blair's spokesman resisted calls for a vote in the Commons and insisted Gordon Brown's commitment to replace Trident was nothing new. {Nuclear Submarine} How can anyone fail to see the obvious contradiction here? There will be a debate, and it will come to the conclusion that Trident needs a replacement. It will cost £25bn, according to the BBC, yet Parliament is not going to vote on it. Some debate! ...

Conservative Home have launched a vote to select a new logo for the Tory party. Now being a big 'Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy' fan I think that the first one featuring the Dolphins reminds me of when the second most intelligent creatures took their leave of Earth. However, their last message was mistaken as a double somersault through a hoop while whistling the star spangled banner. I do

theguardian Diary claimed on Tuesday that frivolous (and, indeed, non-frivolous) Early Day Motions each cost the taxpayer £290. Wasn’t a larger figure than this - four figures, I think - quoted in the past? Surely the actual unit cost can’t be that high? If this is calculated by dividing the total cost of running the system [...]

Seven lessons into my beginners’ Mandarin course, I was contemplating how the brain deals with different language. We were doing a role play of a fruit stall and as the shopkeeper I asked “hái yào?” (”Anything else?”). The customer wanted to say “Nothing.” “Just say ‘rien’,” someone else suggested, and that desire to pluck a word [...]

An interesting defence of supermarkets in Stephen Tall’s blog, taking up a David Cameron theme. As Stephen says: Supermarkets exist, and are popular, because they are good at giving people what they want. Simply to diss them… is to miss the point, or deliberately to avoid it. They are a creation of society’s aspirations to have a choice of quality foodstuffs available at reasonable cost whenever we need them. Stephen makes a strong and decent point here. And of course ‘cheap food’ was an essential part of the old Liberal Free Trade Policy, so this ...

Last night’s Liberal Drinks was another success. In addition to the usual ragtag of regulars, a warm welcome to Mark, Dominic, Ric, Alex and Ed Davey MP as well as a belated welcome to Simon and Oliver who first came last month. As you will have noticed, the logo competition has been decided, and the [...]

Duncan is angry that some poor little Oliver Twist like urchins with barely a limb between them have been packed off to the World Cup after their school organised a particularly expensive school trip only for the money to go to some dodgy touts and no tickets to turn up. Fortunately, Mr Blair stepped in [...]

The Championship's fixtures have now been released, Wolverhampton Wanders will be kicking off at Plymouth Argyle on August 5th, followed by entertaining Ipswich Town at the Molineux on August 8th.

Liberty and free speech are at the centre of what we all hold dear, that famous desire to disagree with what someone is saying but defend their right to say it. However, a story bubbling around the far right website...

Julie & I enjoyed a great day watching Bridgnorth Raft Race. We started the day in Ironbridge. Below you will see some of the my photos as the rafts went beneath The Ironbridge - avoiding the pelted water bombs & eggs from spectators. Some of the rafts got their own back by hurling the same [...]

so evolution hasn't tried to fix them according to this report from today's Guardian. Recently discovered fossils show that lampreys show little change over the past 125 million years. Evolution is often wrongly portrayed as a search for 'progress', meaning from simple dimwitted life forms to complex, clever ones (traditional iconographies of progressive evolution usually culminated in white

Yesterday at Prime Minister's Questions Anne Begg the Labour MP for Aberdeen South asked her leader: While accepting that people can be passionate about football, does he agree that that incident besmirches the reputation not only of Aberdeen, but of the tartan army, who can travel the world without attacking supporters of opposing teams? The Prime Minister's response in full to her question was: My hon. Friend is absolutely right both in what she says and the tone in which she says it. I am sure that everybody condemns what was an appalling and totally unjustifiable attack. ...

Some nasty incidents across Scotland. A child punched for wearing an England shirt . A disabled man in Aberdeen attacked for flying a Cross of St. George from his car. The print journalists have a great story- the "Scots *all* hate the English". Don't you just love the way these scribblers can create a storm of moral outrage? I don't defend the violent morons for a minute, but it is time we looked at ourselves with a clearer eye, and listened a lot less to the ignorant and the simplistic views that comprise the bulk of our media commentary. However, ...

A rather busy day yesterday - mainly meetings about my charity and other things. But the Deputy Mayor and I did fit in a photoshoot to publicise Shades Day. The idea is to get colleagues to wear sunglasses to work on Friday 30th June and in return to contribute to the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association. In the office there is a well-preserved photo of a...

Now read this from the Telegraph. I take it that Brown has won this exchange and that the Tories know it.

So let me get this right our Government says Iran, North Korea and indeed every other country that doesn't already have nuclear weapons shouldn't be allowed to develop them and yet our Chancellor and favourite to be the next Prime Minister wants to update the UK's. Okay that seems fair doesn't it!

Last night I attended the public meeting held by Linlithgow Community Council regaring the parking proposals for the town centre. Many of the proposals in the scheme were torn into because of a number of factors. One thing that did cone out of the scheme is that the officers who drew up this proposal are not taking into account the the full long term picture of the area. In the FAQs in the proposal under 'Why not build a new car park?' comes the response: 'In the short-term, it is not feasible to provide signifigant extra parking space in ...

Labour are also in trouble in Blaenau Gwent where their tactic of campaigning as if they were in opposition has started to backfire on them. Their Assembly candidate, John Hopkins, has said that he wants a police motorbike unit to crack down on yobs. The police say the council will have to pay for it. The cash-strapped council says it has no plans for it. And yet Mr. Hopkins is the leader of the council. His Welsh Liberal Democrat opponent, Steve Bard, has a good line on this small inconsistency: He said, "Labour have again been rumbled ...

The Welsh media cannot put down the story about the Health Minister triggering an inquiry into his own department by pressing the wrong voting button. They have now switched their attention to former ambulance chief Roger Thayne who resigned in May, warning that 500 lives were at risk each year unless there was investment and who called for an inquiry himself. In the chamber on Tuesday the First Minister rather foolishly tried to deflect criticism by attributing unsubstantiated motives to Mr. Thayne for his resignation. He said that Mr Thayne had not been in post long enough to ...

Good job by the party's pointyheads yesterday with the release of a document and campaign comprehensively demolishing the government's case for investment in nuclear, rather than alternative energy. I confess an interest in this subject, I work for an energy company that invests in alternatives. Something I'm rather proud of. However this was a passion of mine before then as well. To me the future of energy provision in this country and on the planet is possibly the most important political issue of our generation. Everything we want to do or achieve in no small part ...

This morning's Independent carries an interesting piece on Lembit Opik's long suffering consort, Sian Lloyd, that indicates that she is less than impressed with her partner's leader so far: Despite being engaged since May 2004, Sian Lloyd has yet to "name a date" to get spliced to matinee idol Lembit Opik. It's already well overdue, though. For Lloyd shows every sign of making a cracking MP's wife. Speaking at the Macmillan Lords versus Commons tug-of-war on Tuesday, the weather-girl managed - in five splendid minutes - to both tell me about future hubby's medical problems, ...

Amidst the maelstrom of yesterdays Council meeting two things struck me. The first was the impressive debut of Cllr Mohammed Iqbal the new Lord Mayor, chairing a difficult meeting. I suspect once he has got his feet under the table he's going to be a tough cookie but a very dignified one at that. Compare and contrast with poor old Chris Beverely of the BNP. He sat through the whole precendings looking vaguely disoriented ( as in fairness any sane person would) all alone on a seperate bench. It was interested to seem him looking bereft at the half time ...

My gut instinct was that yesterdays Full Council meeting would be particularly bad tempered. And so it proved. I suspected the Joint Administration, rattled by the election results would go on the offensive and the Labour Group bouyed by the same results would also go on the offensive. The resulting clashes weren't particularly pleasent and went on for 8 hours. Full Council's start at 2pm (although I sneaked in at 2.50pm) and with half an hours break for a buffet go on till the participants ware themselves out. Having stayed for the Whipped votes and put my two penneth ...

I present to you, 3 jobs Bob (tell him to say 'hi' to odd-job when he next sees him) & his partner in crime, Con job Cameron, or some bloke better known as 'Dave': Photo: David Cameron featured hard right (compassionately of course), 3 Jobs Cheeky Bob & the marvellous Joyce Earl, secretary of the Bromley British Pensioners Trade Union Action Association) Joyce Earl, 75, said: "I asked Mr Cameron to sign our petition to stop privatisation of the NHS to which he declined. "I am very unhappy with the answers he gave ...

For ease of reference, I decided to compile a page containing all my posts on about politics and the Lib Dems since I started writing about the subject back in January when the leadership stuff kicked off. There's nothing new here, it's just for reference.

I was going to add "tomorrow", but I have just noticed that it is now today. Charles Kennedy will be on the panel for Question Time this evening (Thursday). The programme starts at 2245. Also on the panel are Alan Johnson, Oliver Letwin and Germaine Greer. The programme comes from King's Lynn. Thanks to Iain Dale.

In our essay Cohesive Communities David Boyle and I wrote: much of the impetus for the introduction of curfews arises from a lack of contact between the generations. Groups of teenagers hanging around can seem threatening to older people, but if communitarian policies and blanket restrictions lead to less contact between the generations, then such groups will come to seem even more threatening and there will be calls for curfews to be made even more restrictive.As I recall, this paragraph was mine and I borrowed the argument from Stuart Waiton's Scared of the Kids? With ...