LibDem Blogs - Archived! - Monday 11th December 2006

At last, a reason to like Tesco.

According to the BBC, plans for Everton to build a new stadium in Kirby are being bank rolled in great part by Tesco, who plan to build a shop on the site. However, it appears that the fact that Sir Terry leahy, top man at Tesco is an Evertonian also means that this is receiving more support than might have been the case with other clubs. At last, after all my problems with Tesco over the years , a reason to shop at their stores ! Read the full story HERE.

Borough colours

Just have a guess - how many of Kingston's young people have played their sport at County level or above in the last year? 20, 50? I discovered the answer when I was left a pile of certificates to sign a couple of weeks ago - it took quite a while to get through 171 - yes, 171! Each was awarded Borough colours in a ceremony this evening at the Guildhall. Rowing produced...

Fomer Mayoress, Mrs Pat Steptoe

This afternoon I attended, on behalf of the Council, the funeral of Mrs Pat Steptoe. Her husband was elected Mayor of the Royal Borough twice, in 1976 and then in 1985, and she served as his Mayoress. He died some years ago, and she lived on to the grand age of 96. Earlier this year, her daughter, Mary Clark, was elected as a councillor, and she was sure that her mother must have been...

Alfriston

Alfriston Day Centre offers lunch, conversation and activities every day for senior citizens, and I was invited along today. We enjoyed a good roast dinner and some musical entertainment. The members were uniformly enthusiastic about the Centre. As well its weekday operation it also arranges outings and holidays throughout the year, and these all seem to be very...

Digital X-rays?

Digital X-rays - now there's a thought. And that is exactly what this is. It shows a cross-section of a brain taken during a CT scan at Kingston Hospital. For some months the hospital has been using the Picture Archiving and Communication System (PACS). This takes digital X-ray images which can immediately be made available to all the clinicians who need to see...

Why all the fuss about popularity?

I continue my exploration of this Liberal Democrat concept, and become more perplexed by the minute. Mark tells me that he is involved in some sort of debate about selection of candidates for your rather quaint Parliament. Admittedly, you do get one thing right, in that it must be opened by the Monarch, although whoever writes her speeches really needs to get out and about a bit more. What I

Assembly bloggers unlimited

I am now officially taking back any unkind things I may have said about student journalists. This article by Ciaran Jenkins (author of the excellent Blamerbell Briefs) is a well written, entertaining and balanced piece on the Welsh Assembly's bloggers and those we annoy the most - our fellow AMs. When Mark Isherwood says that the more momentum the blogging movement gains, the more "principled politicians are being forced onto the bandwagon as a self-defence measure," my heart just goes out to him - not! There now I have gone and committed the cardinal sin, as best summed ...

Rain in Albania

It has been a busy day, enduring the pelting rain in the Albanian capital. My purpose was to meet with various public figures and discuss ideas about investment. The first port of call was The President of the Republic. As the traffic in the crowded streets of Tirana began to delay us, I got out of the inevitable Mercedes and strode out, in order to meet my appointment on time. I was-just- on time, but President Moisiu has a military sense of timing. I was reminded that "punctuality is the politeness of Kings", as I arrived in his office about ...

Are you thinking what they're thinking?

As the Conservatives and their blinkered friends in "Migration Watch" continue to pedal their warped ideas about immigration, it was interesting to get some information about British emigration overseas. In recent years we have heard a lot from the Tories about refusing to let in "non-European immigration" to the UK. Fascinating to notice that apart from Spain, most Brits chose to leave the UK and go to... Non European destinations. A good thing that the New Zealanders are not arguing "send them back" then. The fact is that emigration/immigration are subjects that are far to complicated to be debated using ...

A bookshop with a view

Chris and I have just had a lovely couple of days in Scotland - the photo above is the view from Starbucks in Waterstones on Princes St, Edinburgh. That’s not a bad old view for a crap American coffee shop - the picture doesn’t do it justice. Last night was great - I’m a man of [...]

Blogging London on Party Sites

Over on LibDem Voice I’ve a small entry on the deafening silence from the LibDem Assembly Members over the hot top of free Oyster cards for London’s youths. Meanwhile over on Conservative Home London Blogger ‘London Salmon‘ has written a long and very detailed policy suggestion for reforming the roles and duties of the Mayor and [...]

I dream of a time when England is sick of Labour and Tories

Hurrah, I get to use that title after all. I wasn't the only person who made the trek from Wesminster to Wembley to see Mozza on Friday. None other than Dave Cameron made the trip too. We both used the Jubilee Line to get there. Only when Dave got there he hadn't got his tube ticket. So what happened - the standard £30 fine. No he got off with just paying his £3 again. Makes you wonder if I would

CIA use Google to find Iran's nuclear secrets

According to the Guardian, the CIA have found a new secret weapon in their battle to gain inside knowledge of the Iranian's nuclear program. It's called Google ! I seem to recall John Wilkes Libertarian Blog also finding that the CIA had looked at his blog recently too. It's amazing isn't it. All that money, all those resources and agents and they still use Google to look things up. Give them more staff and they'll check out Yahoo and MSN too ! Read the Guardian story HERE.

As Ken and Tories go to war over London bus passes where are the LibDems?

This week has seen Mayor of London Ken Livingstone and Conservative Assembly Member Roger Evans trade harsh words over the policy of free bus travel for the capital’s youth. Commenting on his blog Evans said if the eventual Tory Mayoral candidate solicited an opinion he’d recommend axing the scheme. Livingstone responded to the comments by penning [...]

Has Inspector Knacker already interviewed Blair?

The First Post's mole sifts the evidence (if moles can sift).

Reflecting

This time last year we were getting ready to visit family in Malta - this year we're based at home with my son visiting. The warmth of the sunshine last year was amazing and much, much better than these wintry, wet and windy days! We've had a busy few weeks with political dinners, leafleting and community meetings. The highlight was taking a group of my students to the Pump House People's History

87% of statistics are made up !

Today's press excitement over Ian Duncan-Smith's publication of a report about Tory social policy is full of statistics, but light on awareness of what the statistics mean. In order to really understand what the statistics mean, you need to understand the context, and this was sorely lacking when I heard "Dave" on the radio earlier being interviews on Five Live he said words to the effect of ; "50% of co-habiting couples with children will split up before the child reaches the age of five whilst only one in twelve who are married will do this." So ...

It's all about choice

I’m appearing again on Iain Dale’s Vox Politix show over at internet TV station 18 Doughty Street at 9pm tonight. Fellow panellists (attendees? interviewees? - what is the noun?) are Paul Burgin, Kerron Cross and Barckley Sumner. So, as a service to you all, here are your alternatives: BBC1: New Tricks. BBC2: The Choir. (I enjoyed last week’s.) ITV1: Film - Analyze That. C4: Monarchy by David

State education condemns millions of children to the scrap-heap

The failure of Government policy on education was highlighted today in two reports. In one, literacy expert Jean Gross suggests that poor literacy is costing the State £2 billion a year in lost earnings and additional public expenditure. Meanwhile, figures from the Office of National Statistics suggest that there are 1.24 million people aged between 16 and 24 who are not in work, training or education, a 15 per cent increase since Labour came to power. The figure is worse for 16 and 17 year olds, where the increase has been 27 per cent. This comes as no surprise ...

Because it works

Like most people with a public e-mail address, I get a fair amount of spam. It’s irritating, but there are harder things in life than pressing delete. What has taxed me more is trying to work out what the point of spam is. Fair enough if it’s some anarchist attempt to bring down modern society by clogging our communication systems. I can at least understand the rationale of such behaviour.

Torbay Tory PPC - Sponsored by Bearwood Corporate Services

Letter to Herald Express 111206 : As The Independent (30 April) noted, the Tories were able to outspend their opponents to devastating effect in last years’ General Election. 23 of the 31 seats won from Labour by the Tories were targeted by three Tory donors who channelled money directly into constituencies. In 19 of these 23 constituencies the Tories outspent Labour by 2.5 times and the resultant swing to the Tories averaged 4.5%, well ahead of the 3.1% national trend. One of these men, the Belize based tax exile Lord Ashcroft, through ...

Pinochet and Thatcher

Pinochet is dead. I do not mourn him. He killed people. He overthrew a government by force (although does anyone know the status of Chilean democracy before the coup? Was the government likely to submit itself to elections?). That he quite probably believed he was acting in the best interests of his country is no justification for those actions. Thatcher's support for him was misguided. He may

A short Full Council

I thought I wouldn’t be at Council today - I’d made my apologies to my Group, and was planning on sitting home waiting for shiny kitchen appliances to be delivered. They duly turned up mid-morning, leaving me with no excuse for Council at 2pm. There was a very short agenda this month, and a similarly short [...]

Toothless weekend

Bit of a hectic weekend. Only marginally spoiled by Virgin Trains cancelling their services between London and Birmingham on Saturday afternoon. I'd travelled down to the Big Smoke for an exec meeting of the Agents & Organisers Association. My journey down was dead easy on a Virgin pendo, found a table and plugged my laptop in and managed to work most of the way. But the return could have been comical: got to Euston to discover that we would have to take a local train to MK, followed by a bus to Northampton, and a Silverlink service would be "waiting ...

Save Fairwood Hospital

The campaign to keep Fairwood Hospital open has an on-line presence here.

MP Fight!

I can’t believe I’ve lasted this long without coming across MP Fight! - a very silly use for TheyWorkForYou’s API.

Big Bullies

A local resident rang me last night, very upset that on Friday she’d been sent a court summons for an overdue £6 Council Tax bill. She wasn’t working because she was ill, and lived alone. She had a sleepless weekend thinking about the debt, not helped by the fact that a final reminder for the outstanding amount (which should’ve been sent before the summons) actually arrived after it, on Saturday

It's All Greek To Me

I ought to be looking forward to a couple of days in warmer climes, but my select committee's visit to Athens later this week promises to be a somewhat dull and industrious adventure. It's part ...

Greetings from Cowley Street

So today I have started my new job. It is, as readers of Liberal Democrat Voice will be aware, as Internet Campaigns Officer for the Liberal Democrats. What I post on politics from now on will be tempered by being a member of party staff (and I have ceased to be an editor on Liberal Democrat [...]

Cheese and the EU

This story in the Telegraph is causing a great deal of fuss amongst the Eurosceptic and Euronihilist bloggers. I am going to agree with them, it is a scandal. It is illiberal. It goes against the very principles of the Liberal Democrats. Where I will disagree is the response that should be made. The calls to leave the EU are fueled by this sort of story. Those of us who support many of the

Norfolk churches campaign to save local post offices

The Church of England and the Methodist Church in Norfolk are uniting to throw their weight behind a new campaign to help save rural post offices. The campaign, which is being spearheaded by the Revd Lorna Allies, the new Rural Adviser for the Anglicans and Methodists in Norfolk, encourages Christians to turn their backs on the internet and telephone, and return to their local post offices to buy their stamps, collect their pensions and renew their vehicle licences. Leaflets encouraging churchgoers to make an effort to sustain their local post office for as long as some – even just ...

Why Ming is letting the side down on Education

After the Second World War, education policy became a story of two parties, Conservative and Labour, fighting out an ideological battle in front of a Cold War backdrop. Most of the time, this battle completely ignored the best interests of the kids. The tripartite system, whatever the intentions behind it, made the social divide worse. The introduction of comprehensive education was just as bad: it undermined schools that were serving their communities well, and caused huge disruption to pupils. Worryingly, Ming Campbell used his last appearance on BBC Question Time last month to give his wholehearted support to comprehensive ...

Welcome to Will

Will Howells has started work today in Cowley Street as our new internet campaigns officer. Welcome Will!

WE MUST FIGHT LATEST THREAT TO OUR LOCAL POST OFFICES

Suggestions that up to 3000 local post offices across the UK could close are a disdainful attack on small communities. Between 2,500 and 3,000 post offices, mostly in rural areas, face phased closure after a government announcement due on Thursday. The decline in the number of Post Offices under both Conservative and Labour Governments has [...]

Guardian Advent 11th December

Todays link is here. The BBC Gardening website gives you a step by step guide to making your own wreath.

KMT Fail as the DPP Hold on in Gaoxung

Somewhat astonishing Mayoral Election results in Taiwan this weekend. Although the Guomindang (KMT) did win, as predicted, in Taibei (Taipei) - no real surprise as they already held the mayoralty, the big shock was their failure to win Gaoxung (Kaoshiung). Why was it a shock? Well, President Chen Shui-bian's wife and son-in-law are going to be tried next week on charges of corruption. If you can win a major election with that as a backdrop then anything is possible although it has to be said that the margin of victory was a fraction of 1 per cent ...

Thatcher and Pinochet

How nice to be reminded by the unlovely Margaret Thatcher of how horrid she and her party can be ! How thoughtful of her to pay 'tribute' to that mudering despot General Augusto Pinochet. My thoughts are with the families and friends of those murdered in Chile by his regime and I;m very much on the side of democratically elected governments [even ones as bad as her's was ] ! I wonder what 'Dave' makes of this ?!

Tory PPC dismisses Christian Voters' Views !

Unpublished Letter to 'Herald Express' 23 November 2006 On his online diary entry of 22 November Marcus Wood, Conservative parliamentary candidate, reports on the public debate between mayor Nick Bye and Ian Handford of the Civic Society regarding the provision of a ‘super casino’ in the bay. Beyond waxing lyrical about the debating skills of the mayor [and I readily admit he is a talented debater and an eloquent public speaker], he seems to imply that even though the meeting in his words voted three to one against the casino bid that this can be largely ignored as many ...

More Conservative candidate trouble

This time it’s Tynemouth, where a local was beaten by an outside A-lister who didn’t make the original shortlist. That makes it six Tory candidate troubles now, with the candidates starting to open a clear lead ahead of their four lost councils in a week. I feel a barchart coming on … conservatives Opposition watch tynemouth [...]

£500 the Price to be a Tory Councillor !

Letter to Herald Express published 29/11/06 : Far more revealing than your front page story regarding the usage of Lib Dem councillor allowances is the revelation from Kevin Caroll, Deputy Leader of Torbay Council and leader of the Conservative group, that their candidates are expected to pay £250 towards an election campaign and, upon election, pay a similar sum to the party. Surely this undermines David Cameron’s efforts at remaking the Conservatives as a more liberal and ‘inclusive’ party and one attempting to be more reflective of modern ...

Hong Kong Democrats Can Force An Election At Last!

Congratulations to the Hong Kong Democrats who have been successful in the elections to the election committee to select the candidates for the next Chief Executive of Hong Kong. This increases their chances of putting forward a candidate to challenge Beijing nominee and current Chief Executive Sir Donald Tsang. Although Beijing has been very successful in emasculating the political process to reduce the impact of pro-democracy forces in Hong Kong (bringing into serious question their true commitment to the idea of "One Country Two Systems") the Hong Kong Democrats have gradually improved their performance. It is regrettable ...

From bad to worse

Last week Leeds failed to beat Barnsley. This week we lost 1-0 to Derby see report here. By all accounts both from this report and from reports on WACCOE we were lucky it was only 1-0. Although we improved a lot in the second half we could have been four or five down at half time. Then comes this report that Leeds fielded six loan players in the game at Burnley when only five are allowed under league rules! Apparently we cannot count. Thank goodness Dennis Wise is still confident and was quoted as follows We're doing ...

Protest rally passes off

The protest rally in Bangkok yesterday appears to have passed off peacefully. According to the Bangkok post one thousand protesters turned out yesterday demanding the departure of the Council for National Security (CNS) and the interim government led by Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont. They were also demanding the return of the 1997 constitution and fresh elections. The article goes on to say that the protesters plan to rally at Sanam Luang every Sunday from now on, and other anti-coup groups will hold similar demonstrations on Fridays and Saturdays. The Nation reported that a number of anti-coup protesters were prevented from ...

Happy Families

One of the weekend's main policy stories was Iain Duncan Smith's resurrection of the family debate. It spills over into most of today's papers including reports in The Guardian, The Independent and The Telegraph (The Times broke the story yesterday) The stories are all pretty similar - and strikingly similar in one important regard: none of them quote a Liberal Democrat spokesperson. Rather inevitably, Janet Daley fumes on this theme in her column today: "Marriage provides the best conditions for raising children – OK? It is better than lone parenting because two people can cope much more ...

Has Tony Blair been copying me?

Over the weekend I caught up on exactly what Ton Blair said in his recent speech about race relations ... and it looks like what he's now saying is (in some key respects) remarkably similar to what I've been saying! Perhaps he's been reading my chapter on race relations in the recently published book - Britain after Blair... Not sure how I should react to finding he's now saying the same things

A new blog

I notice, slightly belatedly, that my Liberal Democrat colleague, Cllr Matt Davies of Fortis Green ward, has started blogging. Matt I wish you well with this. Bloggers unite!

Keeping the Benches Warm

My prolonged absence from the blogoshere is nothing to do with a hectic whirlwind of Christmas parties. I haven't been to any yet. In fact my first party was supposed to have been tomorrow night...

Even more Tory troubles

I wrote yesterday about the troubles the Tories are having problems with their Parliamentary candidates. News now reaches me that they have lost control of four councils - how very careless!

Campaigning in the High Street

Collecting signatures on Saturday for our "Trip to the Shops" campaign about the poor state of some of Winchester's pavements. There's still time to click on the link and sign our petition!

Petitioning the Assembly

The proposal by the Assembly's Standing Order Sub Committee to provide a direct route for members of the public and other organisations to directly petition us with their ideas and causes after the May elections is definitely the right way forward. It already works well in Scotland where, as the Western Mail points out, it has led directly to changes in the law. My concern is that we are not proposing a committee here in Wales but that the Presiding Officer should receive the petition and direct it accordingly. No matter how inclusive and open the Presiding Officer ...

Did the Tories create the new underclass they now tell us about ?

So the Tories are warning that a new underclass exist in this country. I agree with them, there is, but I disagree with them about whose fault it is. read the story HERE. The simple fact is it takes many, many years to create a new "underclass", not just nine years. The Tories, under Thatcher in particular told people that you didn't matter if you lost your job, they said you didn't matter if you were not contributing to society and indeed, there was no such thing as society ! The mass cull of industrial manual jobs under ...

NHS Financial Crisis

The story in the Guardian today is much like an EDM I tabled over a year ago. Hospitals such as the QE in Woolwich cause major problems for the NHS. If such hospitals are bailed out then this creates a situation where others expect to be bailed out. There is a difficulty in that the NHS Executive handles hospitals as entities. Where bad management occurs that is the fault of the

The cost of running Flock Together

I currently run Flock Together voluntarily in my spare time, but the hosting of the site does cost money. The current hosting arrangements cost over £200 a year, but users have complained about the speed of Flock Together, particularly while we had a lot of people using FT during the Green Tax Switch campaign, so I [...]

Black eyed Bishops

You have to be fair, when the Guardian does gossip, it does it really well: The Rt Rev Tom Butler, 66, one of the Church of England's most senior bishops and a pillar of Thought for the Day on the BBC Today programme, says he has no idea. Others say he was seen sitting in the back of a Mercedes chucking children's toys out of the window and announcing: "I'm the Bishop of Southwark. It's what I do." Last night the bishop - who earlier in the week told a congregation that he could not get his mitre on ...

Day 2158: Hope Springs Eternal

Friday: "Whitehall Press Offices told: ‘clear the decks’ on Monday" says the headline, "Major announcement coming…" Elephant texts Mr Fenwick: is it Lord Blairimort getting banged up, then? Mr Fenwick replies: sorry, no – just the white paper launching the Trident replacement. At whom? asks Daddy. Boom Boom, says Mr Fenwick [This joke previously brought to you by Liberal Democrat Voice!]

Major bush fires hit Victoria

Just come off Skype to mum in Bright, Victoria - where she, my sister and family live. Victoria is suffering major bush fires. Lots of info if you do a google search. But the picture below from the Sydney Morning Herald is from just outside Bright. The black bits on this map are fires. The red arrow points at where they live in Bright and the Yellow arrow points to where my brother in law is

Monday 11th December 2006

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