Red faces in Colchester last week: A policing crackdown on truants hit a snag yesterday when it emerged many pupils were out of the classroom because of teacher-training days. The Âtruancy sweep across Colchester was a joint initiative between Essex Police and educational welfare officers from the county council.All very amusing. But later on the East Anglian Daily Times report says: Pc John
This week has seen the launch of Birmingham - We're Energy Smart, a 12 month campaign to involve Council staff in using energy and water wisely at work. The campaign supports the drive to reduce carbon dioxide emissions - the biggest cause of climate change - by 30 per cent by 2010. Currently, the city as a whole produces six million tonnes of carbon dioxide each year, so there is plenty of scope
Two great eccentrics had their obituaries in the Guardian today. Anna Russell, who has died at the age of 94, was a musician and satirist, famous for her lampoons of Wagner: Once Siegfried has met Gutrune in Götterdämmerung, Russell reminded her listeners, "She's the only woman that Siegfried's ever come across who isn't his aunt." When challenged by Wagnerites who felt she was ridiculing sacred
There was a very odd story in last week's South London Press that claimed the Council's new lottery scheme for encouraging recycling could inadvertently encourage ID theft based on comments from a security expert. In typical SLP style, some quite mild comments were blown up in to "Prize cock-up is winner for ID crooks". The way the new scheme works is you write your address on a little tag and put it around the bag of rubbish outside your door. You can put your name as well, but it's optional, the Council knows who lives where... or rather where ...
Bloody penalties ! Much like England, Norwich are not good at them. Nuff said ! At least Everton won 4-0. I must phone up my brother to apoligise as they beat Luton (his team).
I am into happiness at the moment and I mean happiness in a big way. I love it when people are happy, smiling and laughing and they are genuinely happy. One such occasion happened this weekend. The staff at school was invited to the Isle of Wight to see Sarah (see picture), one of the teachers at our school, get married. Sarah one of those natural teachers. She came into my class as a
So there was a lot of fuss yesterday about how Firefox 2.0 was to be launched today. Then today more fuss about how Firefox 2.0 had been launched today. Yet when I go to http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/ it still shows only 1.5 available to download. It’s now 10pm (BST) so nearly Wednesday, so why can’t I download [...]
The paper edition of the South London Press today reports that bus companies can charge the Police... i.e. the taxpayer, £50 an hour for reviewing CCTV footage from buses that might assist the police in gathering evidence against criminals. Ken Livingstone revealed the charge in Mayor's question time on Wednesday. He describes the charge as "not unreasonable" £50 an hour is the equivalent of paying someone £100,000 a year, the sort of salary you might expect for a senior doctor, judge or city-slicker. It seems excessive for sitting in front of a TV screen and editing video. The ...
Whilst surfing about on the net I came across this on the BBC website “Google offers personal searches“. Now Google had told me in the monthly newsletter about Co-op and as I’ve signed up to almost everything Google have to offer I though I would give this a try. What I’ve been able to do is [...]
Strike-happy lefties have, yet again, brought a national institution to the brink of disaster by striking over pay and conditions. Only this time it is The Daily Telegraph. And the people on strike are the Editorial team.
Today’s proverb: “A watched pot never boils.” Frying tonight. Turkey it was. Only 9 minutes, in theory, so I needed to put the potatoes on first. Boiled the kettle, while heating a little water in the saucepan in preparation for a steaming. Waited, and waited. And waited. Eventually I noticed that the red light that indicates when hob [...]
The season 6 trailer went live at 8pm (BST). Ooh can’t wait, only some two months to go before Fox start showing it again.
Two very thoughtful pieces on events in Iraq here and here. It's their little observations that bring the situation to life for the reader so accurately in a way that none of the reports I've read so far have done.
There have been several discussions on this blog and on Let's Be Sensible that boil down to people's varying perceptions of their own relative well being. This article offers an interesting perspective on affluent Britain, and this piece reminds us how it all started.
Bury Council have issued a statement on “The Retreat” today, which vindicates the Liberal Democrats campaign for progress on clearing up this eyesore. We’ve been leading the fight to get this important local public space put back into use. It’s been left derelict for the best part of two years now. The Labour Council surprised us all recently with two ideas, neither of which were particularly 
Liberal Democrat-run Newbury Town Council has decided to install solar panels on the roof of Newbury Town Hall. The installation will save around a tonne of harmful carbon dioxide emissions every year. Installation is planned for 2007, once planning permission has been given. The solar panels will be out of sight, to preserve the character of this important listed building.
The government needs to explain its Iraq policy to Parliament, the Liberal Democrat leader Sir Menzies Campbell has said. The policy had "failed" and the Iraqi people had to take "responsibility for themselves."
It's not often that I get to sample food from Nigeria, Eritrea, Korea, Ivory Coast and Russia all in one place. The young people in the YOYO Group put together a 'Food From Around the World' food tasting as part of Black History Month. It really was a chance to try out some completely unfamiliar dishes and to discuss the recipes with the cooks. And here they all are, with a...
I am very pleased that West Berkshire Liberal Democrats now have a page for Polish voters.
Our Borough Commander, Chief Superintendant Angela List, is retiring at the end of the month. So I held a lunch reception in the Parlour to bid her farewell and to present her with an engraved plaque to remind her of her times at Kingston. In the 1980s she was posted to Kings Cross where she dealt with a high level of vice-related crime. For some reason or other the Met seemed to think...
I was very sad to hear of the untimely death of Paul Walters, famous latterly as Terry Wogan's Radio 2 producer. He pioneered a unique form of half-off-mike grunts, uhms, aahs and chuckles which acted as the perfect foil for Terry Wogan on his "Wake up to Wogan" show. As such, Paul became much loved as a quiet, unassuming and jovial chap who, nonetheless, was skilled at choosing the music and emails for the programme, helping to make it an overwhelming success with listeners. He will be sadly missed. Terry's tribute show yesterday was a masterpiece - the music was ...
Despite the low number of posts here recently, I still get large amounts of spam comments to clean up. It’s relatively easy to do, and it can occasionally be interesting to see what it is they’re trying to pimp. One thing that they’ve started doing more and more is attempting to link to their poker/prescription drug/hot [...]
Over the weekend I posted a story relating to Chris Thompson, whom I do not know. I was mislead as to the truthfulness of this story. I acknowledge that I was mislead and that story was wholly incorrect. I apologise to both Chris Thompson and and anyone who read this story.
I may well just be the only person out there who is excited at the prospect of Simon Fraser being back on Nikolai Dante, but I just don’t care.
Cool fun will arrive at Redcar High Street this half term with Borough’s first ice rink thanks to Redcar and Cleveland Council. Opening tomorrow, (Wednesday, October 25) the all-weather synthetic polished surface will be open to skaters 10am-9pm daily until Sunday, 29 October with a £3.50 fee per session. The Council’s Cabinet Member for Culture, Leisure and Tourism, Councillor Dave Fitzpatrick, said: “The whole town is really excited about the arrival of this ice rink. “I’m not a very good skater but I will definitely have a go, it’s a fun way to keep fit and spend time with ...
appeared a-book plugging on the Radio 5 Live Simon Mayo show and made some pretty good political points, one being that we have too many ineffective laws. A period of doing nothing, she suggested, would be a good legislative idea. Mayo said that Simon Hughes had made the same point a few months before. That would a Queen's speech worth hearing: 'This year one's gaverment with do nathing at
I've got this serious , personal post I keep planning to write, but I never get round to it. So, as people so liked the last batch of jokes I copied from politicalhumor , here's a few more: "The election is three weeks away and there are rumors the Republicans are getting ready for an election night disaster, which would be a first -- a disaster they were actually prepared for." --Bill Maher "If
'Yes darling, Mummy did work for John Prescott.' I mean, you'd never live down the shame of his failure to cut the growth in car use, would you?
It's just bad manners to withdraw before you finish the job, surely?
According to The Times, Margaret Beckett has said "The Iraq war could be judged a disaster". Well, that's come as a surprise, I mean, I hadn't noticed. I can't believe it, everything is going so well there isn't it ? Its just so bizarre, according to Blair things are going well and it isn't a disaster. Then Britain's top soldier claimed it's a disaster, then when he spoke to Tony Blair, it wasn't a disaster and now Margaret Beckett says it is a disaster. Anyone want to run a sweep stake on when she had to ...
Oh, for goodness sake! This latest spat between the Presiding Officer and his Deputy does nobody any good at all. Even the Labour Party, whose budget may well be passed after all as a result, cannot relish many more newspaper stories like this: Presiding Officer Dafydd Elis-Thomas and his Deputy John Marek have not been on speaking terms for months in a dispute over the Assembly's internal workings. Now a row over who should chair today's crucial debate on the Assembly's draft Budget threatens to plunge the body into chaos. Opposition AMs outnumber Labour by two ...
Amid the media frenzy over Margaret Beckett’s admission that history may not look kindly on the invasion of Iraq, Financial Times, Times, Telegraph. Simon Tisdall had an interesting piece in the Guardian discussing the implications of federalism for Iraq, as the Iraqi parliament debates a bill that would partition the country into its three main regions. Given that the three regions were initially cobbled together by the British for the purposes of Empire, it is unsurprising that there is a move towards re-division, particularly on the Kurdish side. However, as Tisdall points out, such a course of action is as ...
It was all Olympics this morning as my Select Committee questioned the organisations planning and executing the London 2012 event. I was in a beligerant mood wearing my 200 miles from Lond...
Back in Westminster. Health questions today. Providing the MPs called before me don't go on at great length, I might get my chance to hold the Government to account. My question will be an...
Stephen Tall in his latest vid cam gives us a romantic view of web cams. It enables us, he says, to shout out from the rooftops small and insignificant achievements that's someone out there will be able to sympathize with. Stephen is right the internet helped create a culture of people staying in doors and chatting to people we may not recognize. Who is to say Stephen looks like he does? He
The latest edition of the Commons register of Member’s Secretaries & Research Assistants reveals that, with 14 bag carriers, Sir Menzies is employing only four less people than Tory leader David Cameron - and six more than the PM (who admittedly has a fair bit of secretarial support outside Parliament). It reminds me of the old exchange [...]
Looks like I published rather than saved as draft earlier than I intended and a number of people have already read only a disjointed opening paragraph. So here is the full version for your consumption. Iain Dale has thrown his hat into the ring over the West Lothian Question or more to the point the answer to the question. Following the backing of Canon Kenyon Wright for an English
The fact that the Metropolitan Police have actually stated clearly that vote rigging directly affected the result of elections in Tower Hamlets is shocking, but more than that it is actually a positive step forward by the police in the investigation of such matters. In the past it has fallen on the political parties, individuals and other groups to do the investigative work that the police have failed to do. In places like the Midlands and the North West, the police have often failed to take the issue seriously (as if vote rigging isn't a serious ...
I made the point just last week that wholesale fuel prices were dropping but we were seeing no savings in our bills. Now the BBC website is highlighting exactly the point I was making. Which one of the political parties is going to make this an issue to campaign on ? Come on the Lib Dem parliamentary team, fight for a fair deal for consumers !
Former Conservative Leader Michael Howard has been questioned in the Loans for Peerages investigation, will Blair be next.
There are odd bits about the workings of parliament that are not generally known. For example it took me a year to get broadband internet access that allows me to down load emails from my email servers (which are outside the network), but I had a pink ribbon for my sword immediately. Another issue is the differential treatment between members of the House of Commons and those of the House of
The proposals that Jack Straw has put forward for the reform of the House of Lords remind me why politics is too important to be left to the politicians. Since the 1960s politics has lost its sense of vocation and become a profession. MPs are now paid a professional salary and there are recognised career paths that lead into the House of Commons: "lobbyist", "researcher", "campaigner" and so on. The number of people with either business or Union experience in the House of Commons has fallen sharply, while the number of MPs who were previously public sector workers has increased. ...
Fascinating report from the CPRE which can be found here about tranquility in the UK or perhaps more accurately the lack of tranquilty. The two images shown above represent the South East and the South West of the UK and show very contrasting pictures in terms of the amount of peace and quiet we are likely to find in these two areas. It is interesting to see the relative tranquility of whole
Yes they did, but they were Charles Darwin's and the English mountains (well, hills) upon which they walked were the Maer Hills in Shropshire, where the great man was born and spent his childhood. And now someone wants to build a crass-sounding development on them, a collection of houses, a windfarm, leisure park and sand and gravel extraction. Maer Hill Action Group don't want it, and on their (quite rightly) splenetic website warn The Mook is coming. T'internet suggests a Mook is a bit of an eegit, rather than a Grendel-esque mythic beast that rises from ...
two days into the Velux 5 Oceans round the world race, the boats are getting battered by 70 knot winds. Three boats have turned back with storm damage: Robin Knox-Johnston is plugging on, 'Surviving not racing'. He described the conditions in a one word email 'Nasty' (70 knots? That's hurricane force 12. Stick your face out of a car window in a rainstorm at 80 mph to get an idea what he's going through.) and later revealed his secret weapon: 'Irish coffee.' Respect.
Just three of the topics covered in this two minute tour de gloss vidcast: (Or you can watch it on GoogleVideo here.) | < | October 2006 | > | ||||
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