LibDem Blogs - Archived! - Thursday 26th July 2007

The cat who can predict patient deaths

The story of the day has been the tale of Oscar. As the BBC tells it: A US cat that is reportedly able to sense when a nursing home's residents are about to die is baffling doctors.Oscar has a habit of curling up next to patients at the home in Providence, Rhode Island, in their final hours. According to the author of a study in the New England Journal of Medicine, the two-year-old cat has been observed to be correct in 25 cases so far. Staff now alert the families of residents when he sits down next to their ailing ...

Fascinated by Wii

After a short demo of the Wii’s fun potential by my brother, I trotted down to a local game store to make one my own. My tennis is improving, though not as rapidly as I’d like, and 10 pin bowling is a relaxing option, though baseball is still almost entirely incomprehensible to me. My, justifying the expenditure to myself, serious motivation for buying was to investigate the console as a non-PC interface to the internet. This has been fascinating. The built-in Opera web browser is surprisingly good, though inputting text site addresses is a chore without a keyboard. But what ...

Selly Oak Constituency Committee - 31 July 2007

The next meeting of the Selly Oak Constituency Committee will be at 7pm on Tuesday 31 July 2007 in the Dain Room, St Stephen's Church, Serpentine Road, Selly Park. Items on the agenda include: the Constituency Development Plan;the consultation on the future of elderly persons homes; andthe Local Shopping Shopping Centres Programme (which includes the Selly Oak Centre along the Bristol Road from

UK agrees missile defence request???

Dear All, According to the BBC: 'Britain has agreed to a US request for the RAF Menwith Hill monitoring station in North Yorkshire to be used as part of its missile defence system.' I'm not an expert in this so please correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't the proposed US missile defence system contravene several non-proliferation treaties that helped end the Cold War? Hasn't Russia already expressed misgivings about this? I'm no great fan of Putin but this decision could potentially annoy (massive understatement) a lot of people not just Russia and without any immediate tangible benefits - given ...

The Magisterium Committee

A good week of fund-raising for the Family, we been busy selling flood protection insurance to the residents of Hampstead Hill. However, I attend secret meeting tonight. The Committee for the Assassination of the Magisterium is body that plan the elimination of evil Labouristi leader in the London territories, Signor Livingstone. Livingstone is well protected, with vicious reputation for dealing with opponents, so we struggle to find button-man. Last one we send, Signor Hughes, have lucky escape when bomb under yellow taxi miss him by seconds due to length of time he stand on pavement talking to local paisan about ...

Welcome to the world Magnus Charles Dundas

For the fouth time this year I delight in welcoming another wee one into this world. Magnus Charles Dundas came into the world at 11.35pm on Wednesday the 25th of July. My congratulations, and love, go to Mum Siobhan and Dad Charles. Hope to see you three soon.

Blog Revamp

I'm experimenting with a new style for my blog, I'm not sure if it will stay quite like this yet but I'm liking it so far. Let me know if you have any thoughts.

Floods in Witney

The Leader of the Rwandan Conservative Party inspects the damage.

Sad End For Shambo

The efforts to save the sacred bull Shambo seem to have come to naught tonight as Police finally overcame the resistance of 100 Hindu monks and supporters at the Skanda Vale complex near Carmarthen and have taken him away for slaughter. The six year old bullock had tested positive for bovine TB in April and had been ordered destroyed to protect other livestock. The monks won a brief reprieve for Shambo in the High Court last week, but that was overturned by the Appeals Court on Monday. An online petition to save Shambo had attracted over 20,000 signatures, and supporters ...

Ming Comes Out on Top.

Unfortunately I wasn't here to see the results of my Ming poll as I was away abusing my carbon footprint in Portugal and escaping the floods. However, it seems that hot on the heals of his decisive victory in my poll he has also had a couple of by-election 'successes'. Well done Ming. Unfortunately the small swings to the Lib Dems in the two elections have only served to convince me of the continued effectiveness of the Lib Dem by-election teams and not of Ming's leadership. Undoubtedly he has secured his tenure for the time being but don't expect me ...

Southwark Council won't target balcony smoking

Some good news, after this blog raised the issue of a loophole in the government's anti-smoking legislation, that would see £50 fines issued to Council Tenants who smoke on the open-air balconies outside their own flats, Southwark Council, via Housing Executive Member Kim Humphries, has moved quickly to distance itself from strict enforcement in today's Southwark News. The Opposition has also agreed it is not something they would welcome, although have given no indication as to whether they would lobby their own government to amend the law. The law though still remains daft, so there is a chance that such ...

I don't want to worry David Cameron, but ...

With reference to the story posted earlier here by myself and here by Ed Maxfield, worrying pictures have emerged of the little cat in question and his latest snooze !Don't worry David, if it is anything like the speech you made this week to the Rwandan Parliament then nobody will be there to see it.

Lib Dem challenge to Labour Council

Posted by Chris: In view of the adverse publicity in the Evening Gazette and the damage it may have done to the reputation of this Council and its professional officers, Glyn Nightingale and I have written to the Director of Finance and Procurement and the District Auditor to request that a Section 151 report is produced as a matter of urgency and presented to a special meeting of the Council. The report should outline the current financial pressures, explain the allegations of financial mismanagement made by the Council Leader and set out the details of what exactly the alleged £12m ...

Blog survey

I've just spent the past hour filling in a survey for the School of Library, Archive and Information Studies at University College London about blogging and its impact on political debate, constituents and the media. It asked why I do a blog. For political comment I think is what a great many political bloggers are expected to write. Okay, yes I do write some political commentary but thanks to

Exclusive - the Conservatives' new song

Following the disaster of the Conservatives' by-election performance last week, I can now reveal exclusively that there has been a Tory rethink on their branding. This is their new campaign song.

From Malthus to Deng in one easy think tank

Call yourself a “Think Tank” and it’s amazing what people will fund. The Optimum Population Trust (OPT) is concerned with the effects of population growth on the environment. It has therefore proposed compulsory limits to family size if urgent action is not taken to restrain population growth through voluntary family planning. This is a common sort of nonsense that crops up from time to time: there are too many of us, they bleat; we are out-consuming our little old planet. OPT suggest that we are consuming 25 per cent more than our planet can sustain, which is odd, because our ...

Praise for Highbury Grove

I was delighted to discover that the good work of Highbury Grove Secondary School (where I’m a governor) is highlighted in today’s Independent. Highbury Grove has faced a lot of challenges over the years, but earlier this year was judged by Ofsted to be a ‘good’ school, which is a great turnaround.

Should a strippogram, kissogram and sex chat lady be approved as a candidate?

It is an interesting question. The lady in question on Bideford Town Council was reportedly not a party member when selected and, incredibly, still isn't: Yesterday (Tuesday), it became clear that Mr and Mrs Bushell were not members of the Liberal Democrat party when they were selected to stand in the May elections. Noel Thompson, chairman of Torridge and West Devon Liberal Democrats, said it

Daily Mail: ‘The woman who is a stripogram, kissogram and a Lib Dem councillor’

And it’s causing ructions in Bideford Town Council in Devon. The full Mail story is here, while the North Devon Gazette’s report is here. Putting aside the faux-outrage of the Mail’s typical nudge-nudge coverage - complete with large, provocative photos - there are some interesting issues here: - should the fact that Cllr Bushell operates a sex-line [...]

Should Charlotte Church be treated at Chequers?

Well done to Norman Lamb for eliciting the information that Tony Blair's guests at Chequers, in his last few months as PM, included: -Charlotte Church -Gavin Henson -Lorraine Kelly -Richard Madeley -Chris Evans -Vernon Kaye It speaks volumes about this government's lack of commitment to freedom of information that it took months of effort to extract this information, as Norman comments: For

"Outright derision" at Conservative HQ for Cameron's Rwandan trip timing

Rather like the shoe chauffeur, David Cameron now has another millstone around his neck: His trip to Rwanda while Britain was flooded. Of course, it is right that politicians visit Africa. But the timing of his trip was bizarrely misjudged. Philip Webster in the The Times summarises the situation thus: Why he had chosen to go there when the Commons was in its last week, and not during the

My Big Brother Theory

Why is Big Brother such a big deal, here’s my suggestion for one cause. Back in the good old days there was such a thing as community and part of that was what became known as garden wall chats. Ok I don’t really go for all that community stuff; a community is a group of individuals, the workings of the group is a matter out of anyone’s control. The demise of the garden wall chats is however a well recorded passing. The garden wall chat was essentially gossip between neighbours. The growing isolation that we keep our selves in today ...

Bad end of a bad week for David Cameron

A bad week for David Cameron is topped off by a poll which finds that more than half of all voters think he is not in control of his party. Indeed, only 22% of those questioned thought he was in control of the Conservative party! The weeklies are now putting the boot in. Bagehot in the Economist writes: LIKE the rest of life, only more so, politics is not always fair. Not long ago, David

Written Parliamentary Question 26th July 2007

Justice: Departments: Ministerial Red Boxes Q:To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many ministerial red boxes the Department bought in each of the last five years; what the cost of each was; who the suppliers were; and what tendering process was used in selecting them. A:Red boxes are used by successive Ministers over a number of years. The specific information requested for the

Written Parliamentary Question 26th July 2007

Innovation, Universities and Skills: Departments: Ministerial Red Boxes Q:To ask the Secretary of State for Innovation, Universities and Skills how many ministerial red boxes the Department has bought since establishment; what the cost of each was; who the suppliers were; and what tendering process was used in selecting them. A:None. David Lammy (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Department for

Who to Replace Bush? ~ The Republican candidates are ranked

Earlier this week i looked at the Democrats Candidates for the party's Presidential nomination, and as promised today im going to look at the Republicans candidates. the rankings are from Msnbc.com and the rankings are as follows; Flyweight - Weakest potential candidate Lightweight - Weak potenital candidate Welterweights - Moderatly weak potential candidates at the moment Middleweights - Moderatly strong potential candidates at the moment Heavyweights - Strongest potential candidates at the moment Before getting onto the list of current candidates, There is someone else who should be considered in this list, and as u can tell by may use ...

Are the wheels really coming off the bicycle?

David Cameron hasn't had a good few days.The sketch writers give the most damning verdicts...[The Conservatives] are not serious about wanting power... They just haven't done the work. And they're still not doing it. For instance: the new text for the coming EU conference. Cameron says it's the Constitution by another name. But has he read it? Has he compared it with the Constitution line by line? Has he - or his researchers - got a list of copy-and-paste similarities to make the case? (Brown's admirers mistake pure dullness for honesty)...says Simon Carr in The Independent "The Tories, he said, ...

Flooding in Muswell Hill

Going to my constituency office today, I get a call from the police telling me of a flood in Muswell Hill at the bottom of Ally Pally – so I head over on foot to see what’s up. (See the photos over on Flickr). All traffic had been stopped. Encountering a policeman I ask what is happening and he gets a car to take me up to the meeting place where Chris Donaldson from the Metropolitan Police is in charge and all of the agencies were coordinating their work. A 24 inch main had burst and a torrent of water ...

Meeting Peter Hendy

Wednesday evening met with Peter Hendy, Commissioner of Transport for London. My three asks were: extending the 603 bus route to run all day and evening (as always); the transport issues around the new London Health Trust plans including the 'polyclinics' (we need to ensure there are good public transport links for any such); and whether he would think about encouraging car clubs (where people share cars) via a congestion charge incentive. So - number 1 - the 603 bus from Muswell Hill to Swiss Cottage. Well - the possibly good news is that it comes up for review next ...

Who was the greatest British Liberal?

Readers of Lib Dem News will have had their attention drawn by Lord Tom McNally to a poll asking: who is the Greatest British Liberal? (The question is being posed by The Journal of Liberal History, and voting is open only to members - you can join here.) Here’s the short-list of 15 drawn up by the [...]

Good news for Man City fans, less so for Spurs

Having just been discharged from jury service for good (I did at least get to see the inside of a courtroom yesterday, even if I was never put on a trial), just seen on BBC News that Man City have signed Martin Petrov from Atletico Madrid. Another good signing by Sven-Goran Eriksson... will be interesting to see if he can take Man City back where they belong. I hope so, the City fans are great. A shame for Spurs though, was hoping that we would sign Petrov. Have to wait and see what other signings we might make in the ...

Spooky flooding foresight…

Slightly disturbed to find our basement in The Old Library in Burgess Park, South London flooded last week. Even more disturbed because only the day before I had been giving a presentation about climate change to the Southwark Alliance. My uniquely talented PA Seb and our unneccesarily tall volunteer, Will had put together some materials showing how South London in general and my office in particular really takes a pasting if the Thames floods. The maps they dug out for me show that, with a sea level rise of seven metres, a huge swathe of South London ends up underwater. ...

Scottish Lib Dems face fine for late accounts

The Herald has the story: The party’s accounting unit missed a deadline to hand over final figures to the Electoral Commission. Parties can face a hefty fine over failure to submit accounts. … A Lib Dem spokeswoman said a copy of the draft accounts was submitted to the commission on the Monday after the July 7 [...]

Tenbury toilets trashed

The Shropshire Star reveals another victim of the floods: the Victorian public lavatories in Tenbury Wells: Shropshire Star reader Ian Little ... said: “The recently refurbished historic Victorian Toilets in Tenbury Wells were destroyed this morning. “Although they have stood for a hundred years and were completely undamaged by the recent floods, they were no match for the might of Malvern Hills District Council.”Alex Foster will be devastated.

Pubs and Buses

The last couple of days have been fairly busy, and the next couple promise more of the same. I followed up a resident complaint about noise coming from The Priest's Retreat pub on bury New Road in prestwich Village the other day, and the Council's Environmental Health staff went and checked it out. Whilst there they did discover a noise problem, but also some pretty severe licenisng violations.

Are the Lib Dems targeting air con ?

Dizzy has an interesting analysis of written questions being asked by Norman Baker and Chris Huhne about government use of portable air conditioning units and asks is the party planning an extra tax on air conditioning units in the home ? I would suggest that such a policy would possibly have a negative impact on our poll ratings and would, inevitably raise questions about raising tax on cars too as 75% of cars now produced have air con as standard. Such a policy could open a real can of worms. Of course we have to do our part for the ...

Tory Rwanda trip: Exclusive

"Iain Dale, I presume."

Office Vacancy

My past three interns are now working full-time for Members of Parliament and I am now able to offer an internship in my constituency office. All the details are on www.w4mp.orgAdrian Sanders MP is of...

Look, the cute little cat has curled up next to me. Ahhh !

Can you imagine the look on residents face every time the cat in this story enters the room ? Who is he going to sit net to today ?

A wildlife in London

I filmed this a few weeks ago in the street where my flat is in suburban London. Ducks in the street and squirrels in the back garden. We also have foxes living there as well though I am yet to catch them on camera. In Gateshead my house is in a village surrounded by countryside. Whilst the bird population is bigger and more diverse, we have no ducks living in the street! And no foxes either. We

Should the government raid dormant accounts ?

The government has announced plans to use money from dormant accounts, bank accounts that the government believe to be unclaimed, in order to fund the building of more youth facilities across the country. Whilst you can only applaud the government's new found commitment to supporting youth facilities, I am left wondering whether stealing money from what the government says are dormant accounts is fair, liberal and legal. Yes, I am sure the government has a legal right, but morally you would have to describe the actions as theft. Then there is the question of fairness. Is it fair that someone ...

A lesson from King Canute

As various government members make promises about funding for flood defences, while wavelets lap gently against the interior walls of thousands of dwellings, my thoughts naturally turn to King Canute. I gather he was a real king (Cnut, Knutr, reign 1016-1035, Danelaw zone only). He seems to have been a very competent leader, so if it is true that he sat on his throne on the seashore and commanded the waves not to advance, I feel sure he did so to make a point to his courtiers about the futility of claiming power over nature, rather than because he actually ...

Grim Reaper Cat

I would not want this cat as a pet!

Seeds of Love

I read on the website of Somerton and Frome Conservatives, that their candidate, Ms Annunziata Rees-Mogg, “has a long standing interest in cultivating indigenous trees.” I wonder if this fascination with matters arboreal stems from her brother's interest in lesser botanical specimens?

Burma report

Well done to the Independent for leading with this Burma story today. http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia/article2802617.ece

Bush can do what he likes - his unpopularity can hardly get any worse

The Washington Post reports that George Bush's unpopularity rating stands at 65%. Since polling began, Presidents have only twice been more unpopular. Truman hit 67% during the Korean war and Nixon hit 66% four days before his resignation. This plumbing of the heights of unpopularity has caused a very strange attitude in the White House: Bush has been so down for so long that some advisers

Ten Things We Could All Change Today

1) Switch your electricity supply to a renewable energy provider like Good Energy (http://www.good-energy.co.uk/) or Ecotricity (http://www.ecotricity.co.uk/). They will generate electricity using wind turbines, solar panel, water turbines and gas from food or animal waste. 2) Change your light bulbs to energy-saving ones. Switch off unused electrical appliances. NB An estimated 8% of the UK’s carbon emissions are caused by appliances left on stand-by. 3) Install draught exclusion measures around doors and windows, lag your boiler, and consider getting cavity wall and loft insulation. 4) Use a compost bin for your garden and kitchen waste. If you have a balcony, ...

Ming lays odds on date of next general election

Clearly the Lib Dem leader has been putting a lot of thought into this, and has shared with BBC Online the following order of likelihood of the date of the next general election: October 2007 - 15% May 2008 - 35% May 2009 - 50% Well, as Alan Hansen would say, you’ve got to play percentages.

Green efforts take a knock

We decided to start growing veg in the back yard. Not exactly the Good Life, but we have three containers with different plants in them. Well we had. The rain has done in the carrots entirely (they are completely under water) and the salad greens look to be going the same way. We have only managed to rescue the courgettes. Clearly this gardening lark is a bit harder than I thought.

£1.7 million: the price of TB’s farewell

This from today’s Mirror: TONY Blair entertained celebrity guests as part of his farewell world tour with a string of leaving parties and foreign jaunts that cost taxpayers £1.7million. The former PM racked up a bill of £235,285 on a visit to say goodbye to George Bush and California governor Arnie Schwarzenegger. Mr Blair’s overseas travel [...]

No defence

Thursday 26th July 2007 - Even though flood defences in Carlisle are in place and phase two is moving in, seeing the shocking scenes across the country in the past few weeks, people in the region remain vulnerable and frightened that the devastation of 2005 could happen all over again. The government is doing very little to qualm our fears. Last year, Defra cut spending on flood risk management

Give us back our children - Sue Reid

The link is to Sue's story in the Daily Mail. Another story today is about how England's youth is the worst behaved in Europe. So we have more state intervention in the Family and our youth are the worst behaved. There is evidence that these two aspects are linked.

The Harry Potter subtext debate

There’s a fascinating debate raging among Lib Dem bloggers (where else?) regarding the seeming absence of gay characters in the Harry Potter books; and whether it matters a damn. It was prompted by the Clowns to the Left of Me blog posting, ‘Why aren’t there any gay characters in Harry Potter?’ (I assume the question refers to the book, rather than to the character, or else I missed a

Prom 16: Your head held high

It was not without good reason that the audience in the Gallery leapt to their feet at the end of Prom 16, it was not without good reason that Marin Alsop was called back for five bows (rather than the more ‘regular’ Proms three) it was not without good reason that we were disappointed not to hear an encore. But no disappointment could infringe on the fact that the audience had heard the most magnificently rousing rendition of Copland’s Symphony Number 3. It is no overstatement to say that the audience positively buzzed as they left the Royal Albert Hall ...

Top Gear North Pole race - sheer quality!

Last night's Top Gear Polar Special was a treat. If you missed it, it's repeated this Sunday on BBC2 at 8pm and there are clips here. Basically Clarkson and May raced to the North Pole in a Toyota 4x4, while the Hamster was pulled by a team of Huskies. The Hamster deserved to win. Unfortunately Clarkson and May got their first, but not before they had been through a gruelling couple of days

Computing uncovers £50m ID card consultant costs

A Freedom of Information request by Computing magazine reveals: The government has spent £53m on consultants for the national biometric identity card scheme, and continues to use 83 external contractors at a cost of nearly £50,000 per day. The figures are more than double the value of the original £19m pre-procurement consultancy contract signed in 2004. Read the rest here.

Shropshire to go Unitary

It was announced yesterday that Shropshire will be going unitary. The new authority will be based on the County (though with twice as many Councillors, staying on County Divisions). The intention that all new authorities are fully up and running in 2009.

Christ Redeemer (Brazil)

Following my post Global vote picks Seven Wonders Jonathan Wallace sent me an email to say that he thought the Christ Redeemer (Brazil) was well worth visiting since you get a panoramic view of the city.

Blue Jeans and Chinos

Another great new young liberal blog has arrived, it is Simon Radford’s entertainingly named (from a pretty excellent Daily Star sports headline) kop lob pob a job. Simon is great source of US political insight, and I will be looking out for analysis of the Republican, and especially Democratic Presidential primaries on his blog. He is an Obama fan. I’m not yet sure. I know I don’t like John Edwards, he’s mealy mouthed. I don’t think Hilary Clinton would be a successful candidate, though her experience in adopting strategically intelligent positions is likely to be helpful at this stage, and ...

Life with Lembit

Today's Western Mail reports that Siân Lloyd is about a third of the way through writing her life story – provisionally called Sunshine and Showers. The paper speculates that the book will dish the dirt on her ex-fiancé, Lembit Öpik, though they offer no direct quote from Siân herself to confirm that. One can almost hear numerous journalists salivating in expectation. I would hope that Siân herself has more class than to succumb to such a base temptation.

Shambo, the sequel

Radio Wales is currently providing near-live coverage of scenes at Skanda Vale as a group of reporters and peaceful protesters await the arrival of Welsh Assembly Inspectors to take away Shambo the bullock for slaughter. They were due at 8am but have still not turned up. Nobody knows what will happen. I suspect that there will be some sort of sit-down protest and that inspectors may have to force locks so as to get Shambo out, but apart from that nobody is really expecting trouble. No doubt there will be a large contingent of police officers offering support. Perhaps they ...

Day 2396: Evolution of the Elephants – Let's See Those TEETH!

Tuesday: Scientists working on my episode of "Who Do You Think You Are" have traced my FAMILY TREE. We have discovered some exciting and interesting facts: AFRICAN elephants and ASIAN elephants are, as you all know, all descended from a COMMON GRANDPA elephant, but apparently their nearest common ancestor – "Gramps" – must have lived something like seven-and-a-half MILLION years ago! This is at least TWICE as long ago as when you humans' monkey-esque ancestor Australopithecus afarensis is thought to have evolved. In fact, it is about that time that the common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees was living in ...

The Realism Battle Was Lost Before It Began

There has been some discussion as to J.K. Rowling's lack of any ostensibly gay or even camp characters in the Harry Potter books. It's not that it doesn't matter because i don't care about gays being represented or anything. Instead, it's because a great deal of what you might think to be even more important subject matter for grounding a novel in realism is glaringly ommitted, so why shouldn't homosexuality? I think when you consider the two following things, it puts Rowling's lack of gay characters into perspective: 1) Harry doesn't actually kiss a girl until he's 15. Don't know ...

Guess who's coming to tea ?

Well done to Norman Lamb for his hard work over some years in getting out of the powers that be the list of all those guests who have been wined and dined at Chequers at our expense, as guests of Tony Blair. The bizarre list include Vernon Kaye, Charlotte Church, Adrian Chiles and a whole host of celebrities that really leave you asking the question "What on earth were they doing there ?" It seems that Tony Blair liked to surround himself with celebrities on order to make himself seem more important in the same way as the Beckhams have ...

This post will not incite a ‘moral panic’

I’m listening to Five Live, wanting to keep up with any news of Rasmussen’s withdrawal from the Tour de France, only to discover that one of the guests is Claire Fox from the Revolutionary Communist Party Living Marxism LM Institute of Saying Whatever Will Get Us On The Air Ideas, spouting the old nonsense about ‘why shouldn’t they all take drugs if they want to?’, though not taking that to the logical conclusion that, really, why should they do it all on bikes? Surely it would be quicker for them all to drive or fly along the route, or maybe ...

Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip

Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip a drama set behind the scenes of a comedy TV series created by Aaron Sorkin and produced by Thomas Schlamme staring Matthew Perry as Matt Albie (Chandler Bing of Friends) and Bradley Whitford as Danny Tripp (Josh Lyman of The West Wing) will be on More 4 starting at 10pm tonight.

Thursday 26th July 2007

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