From a Philip Webster story on The Times website: It has also emerged that Mr Brown has spent £39 billion in his first seven weeks at No 10. Sadly, this sentence was hit by a printing error and some text was lost from it. But I can reveal now what The Times really meant to publish was: The Guardian has [...]
No 1 and No 3 this week!
Well done to Everton tonight, having more shots than Tottenham, more shot son target than Tottenham, committing less fouls than Tottenham and scoring three goals to Tottenham's one. Top of the league already, there's no looking back now. Well done to David Moyes too . Whilst other teams have spent tens of millions, Everton actually only spent a net £4 million overall, showing that you don't have to be owned by a foreign billionaire to have some success.
Water {A water tap} is all around us. We drink it – although most of us should probably drink more of it – I know I need to. We shower in it - at least I hope we all do. We swim in it – that is, if you are one of the lucky ones considering the British summer. We are even made up of water ourselves. And it's a deadly serious area of international development policy. Labour is dead keen on only helping to fix the water supply crisis in many developing countries by using public-private partnership type setups. ...
I did wonder if George Osbourne and John Redwood were possessing some higher intelligence which will lead them to make an astoundingly populist announcement on Friday which will start a vast wave which will deposit David Cameron on the shores of Downing Street after the next election. People will lap up their £13 billion giveaway for business, at the expense of longer working hours and less
I am in the pink house and it was still daylight (just) at 21:20hrs.
This could be an interesting development: Google has announced that their Google News front page is going to start accepting comments from people. However, it won’t be a comment free-for-all; rather the people allowed to comment will be the subjects of the news stories themselves.
I was out again with Lib Dem colleagues tonight knocking on doors, canvassing. What strikes me is the amount of people who have said they are taking the time to read all the parties' literature before deciding how to vote. Obviously the increased activity, especially from parties who have not campaigned in this ward before, has provided the residents with a real opportunity to vote for a person
so, ive been in Barnsley for the last week or so, as last week it was my mothers 50th birthday :) I came back on monday, on the train, which took longer fthan normal as there are, or at that point were, no trains between lincoln and sheffield (due to a problem with the track at Kiviton, caused by the floods). So i got the train to doncaster, and then on to meadowhall, which actually turned out to be quicker than it usually is. got picked up from the station, by my mum and my borther david, and then headed ...
After saying clearly and categorically that they would do nothing to disrupt passengers or the safe working of Heathrow Airport, Sky News reports that an e-mail from the protest groups shows they plan very much the opposite. Telling people to bring uniforms, so as to be able to impersonate airport staff is possibly the most dangerous of all the things they plan, showing a flagrant disregard for the safety issues and anti terrorist measures now in place. Other measures include plans to being business clothes in order for them to be able to get in to the airport to cause ... 
Good news. Sandra Gidley, the Lib Dem MP for Romsey and one of the pioneers of blogging at Westminster, has revived her blog Romsey Redhead.
Well they may be umpteen million pounds in debt, but they heven't lost their sense of humour. Way to go Doc!
Defra have set up a 3Km temporary control zone around the park this afternoon. This means that no livestock can be moved within the area. A sheep is being tested for foot and mouth but it seems that Defra is being, quite properly, very cautious, and it is unlikely that the result will be positive. The BBC covered the news a short while ago but did not name the second...
So I watched the Dawkins show last night which was alrite. Better at least than the last show he did. His synopsis of existing spiritualism is quiet interesting and like one review I read I do think it deserves a series. (It can feel as if you getting the radical conclusion of each argument rather than the whole argument.) There is though one fatal flaw, what his vision is, luckily the show isn’t based around what he proposes and he largely hints towards it. His vision seems to be one of utter dedication to fact, reason and science, what he ...
Following all that comotion about what colour the tree should be I wondered if anyone else spotted in Labour or red tape red on Channel four news on sunday. Is Cameron showing his true colours??? 
Because of having had such a turbulent few weeks with little access to my blog I seem to have a whole basketful of unfinished tomes.............anyway - here is a summary. A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of spending a couple of days at the LGA conference. Highlight for me had to be Simon Hughes' speech. Not only because I am a confessed Simonphile, but particularly because his ten point programme for local government had top of the list investment in Youth Service and in particular in detached youth work. As someone who has spent most of my working ...
The link is to one of the stories where Wakefield Childrens Services sacked Care Workers for blowing the whistle on child abuse in Wakefield Childrens Homes. This seems to happen with considerable regularity. Vide Haringey. Six care workers sacked for revealing a shocking catalogue of mismanagement in children's homes to the Yorkshire Post have won a £1m settlement from Wakefield Council.
Someone having had the brilliant idea of combining Oyster Cards with bank / credit cards, TFL have signed a deal so that only Barclaycard holders will have that privilige for three years. It’s a UNIVERSAL TRANSPORT NETWORK. Cretins.
Watching Richard Dawkins meet Derren Brown on The Enemies Of Reason documentary, I was struck by the idea that if it were fiction, they’d likely then use that as a basis to team up and fight irrationality-based crime.
The breaking news is that Foot and Mouth may have affected livestock on a farm in St. Mary-in-the-Marsh on the Romney Marsh in Kent. If confirmed this is really tragic news. Fingers crossed that this hasn't happened. It would be very bad news for the local economy if the virus has spread down there.
Millennium Elephant, a 2006 finalist in Lib Dem Blogger of the Year, has written exclusively for Lib Dem Voice on the state of politics today. Hello! That nice Mr Lord Deputy Lord Mayor Lord Stephen has asked me to write a special diary for his august organ. This is a PUN… because it is AUGUST! I think [...]
There has been much in the press about the death of a Hells Angel on the M40 this weekend. In my early years of going to pubs I used to occassionally drink in one in Welling frequented by Hells Angels. Gleaming Harley Davidsons would be lined up outside. Many with carefully crafted notices on the seats not to touch them. The riders of them were some of the most pleasant people you could ever
(Picture by Colin Crawford) Working Title and Universal Pictures International UK in association with Redcar & Cleveland Borough Council, Northern Film & Media and BAFTA are pleased to announce the regional premiere of Atonement in Redcar at 7pm on Wednesday, September 5 2007. Atonement - Joe Wright's spectacular adaptation of Ian McEwan's novel starring Keira Knightly and James McAvoy will receive its regional premiere in north-east coastal town of Redcar. Director Joe Wright will return to Redcar, where he shot a number of the film's key scenes using 1,000 local extras, to attend the premiere screening which will take place ...
President Bush's closest strategist and deputy chief of staff Karl Rove resigned yesterday, prompting an outpouring of editorials and comment. Rove is variously regarded as the 'boy genius' behind Bush's two successive presidential victories and congressional victories in 2002 and 2004, and by democrats as something close to the devil incarnate - the machiavellian string puller behind everything from the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame to the smearing of of Senators John Kerry, Max Cleland, and John McCain.All of which is perhaps a little hysterical. The truth is almost certainly more mundane. If Rove was such a genius, why did he fail so completely to ...
I arrived home last night to receive an annual report from my Lib Dem MEP. So am I rejoicing? Well, actually no. The MEP selection process is in a "phoney war" period. Nominations have closed. I think it is wrong for any incumbent to be able to take advantage of their position in this way at this time - the same applied to emails during the GLA selection. To compound it, the publisher of the
The Independent reports that first-year university students are totting up record debt levels of nearly £6,000 a year and face leaving university owing more than £17,500. This is a 25.5% increase on the debt levels incurred by first year students in previous years. For some reason the University of Glamorgan has the second highest level of first-year student debt in the country with an average of £7,942. Two of the three universities where students have the least debt are in Scotland - Robert Gordon with £1,103 and Abertay Dundee with £1,123 - where they do not have top-up fees. The ...
Just heard the very sad news that Lord (Tim) Garden has passed away, at the age of 63. Tim was widely respected across all parties and an excellent speaker. He spoke at the last adoption meeting for Lynne Featherstone. He will be a great loss to the House of Lords and intelligent debate in general, my thoughts are with his family.
Ive recently discovered that my friend Sean Hanley has a blog. It’s well worth a read if you are interested in East European politics. He has a book coming out soon but I cant recommend it yet because I am still waiting to be sent a review copy (hint, hint). I note he says this about Paddy. Whether it is an accurate assessment, I couldnt possibly comment… {:-)} “There’s a slightly know-all, even sanctimonious edge to Ashdown, but on he’s articulate, to the point and clearly a high calibre politician who knows what he’s talking about. Best Foreign or Defence Secretary ...
Gales; rain; cold, dark nights and live football on the radio - it must be August! I cant share Norfolk Blogger’s optimism that a 0-0 draw at Preston is a good start for City’s ‘injury ravaged’ squad - it’s the first day of the season for heaven’s sake, did they all trip over their sand castles or something? But I will no doubt be drawn in again by peaks of excitement and despair and the thought of Jamie Cureton knocking in a hat trick at Portman Road. At least Rapid are off to a good start, thanks to a dodgy ...
Isn't funny how political parties spend years campaigning against spin and the vacuous politics and gestures of the Tony Blair years only to get in to power and then sound exactly like Tony Blair. Today the SNP launched what it called a "national conversation". What does this mean ? It means exactly the same as it did when Labour did the same thing two years ago. So what is the SNP's national conversation ? Well it appears that it involved the SNP spending a lot of tax payers money on going round the country indoctrinating/education people on why Scotland should ...
Not only does is the right to bear arms (ie wands) hold in JK Rowling’s Harry Potter books (albeit only for those deemed competent - Hagrid is not so should not have his wand), but Marginal Revolution points out that compulsory education is not part of the Wizarding world, until Voldemort gets into power that [...]
It comes from the Shropshire Star. John Biffen was MP for Oswestry and then Shropshire North from 1961 to 1997.
I was very sorry to hear of the death of Tim Garden. I met him when I was a member of the Lib Dem federal policy committee and found him kindly and approachable. He was one of the figures who, in recent years, have made the Lib Dem voice so authoritative on defence and foreign affairs. Jonathan Fryer has written his obituary for the Guardian, and there is one in the Daily Telegraph too. There are also some tributes on the party's own website. Tim Garden's blog remains on line.
It has been 100 days since I was elected as a Councillor for St Mary’s Ward. I realize that President Roosevelt managed to forge the New Deal and rescue the USA from the depths of depression within 100 days, and I can’t lay claim to that. But I think that together we’ve achieved a good deal in the first 100 days. And, let’s face it, the USA hasn’t stumbled into a depression, so technically they didn’t need saving this time round… Since the election, Donal O’Hanlon and I, your local Lib Dem team in St Mary’s have: - Opposed congestion ...
The Liberal Democrat Leader Ming Campbell has called for the Government to review its strategies in Iraq and Afghanistan following the revelation that British troops in Afghanistan are more likely to be killed in action that at any time since the Second World War. The Daily Mail reports: Soldiers are being killed in such numbers that if the current level continues the losses will be greater than among U.S. troops in Vietnam. One in 36 would not survive a six-month tour of duty - a more chilling toll than experienced in the Falklands or the Korean War. […] LibDem leader ...
Hands up – before this week who in the UK had ever heard of the US sub-prime mortgage market? I hadn't. I knew risk was shared around but I didn't know there was a fully-functioning – or s...
{george-galloway.jpg} When I tell people I live in Tower Hamlets, I’m often asked, ‘Oh, have you got that George Galloway as your MP?’. As I don’t live in Bethnal Green and Bow, it has been a great relief to be able to reply ‘No, thank God!’. Some of my near neighbours, who do, are still cringeing from his antics on ‘Big Brother’, not to mention his style of politics. But now he’s declared that he is shifting seats next time, to Poplar and Canning Town (where I DO live). What have I done to deserve this? During the 2004 European ...
Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council wants you to have your say about a Planning Guide for the new district centre, health and social care village and housing at Low Grange Farm, South Bank. Proposals for a new district centre, health and social care village and over 800 new homes at Low Grange Farm, South Bank have been agreed following a public examination earlier this year. The Authority has now drawn up a planning guide - the Low Grange Farm Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) - setting out the Council's requirements for the design and layout of the scheme. To find out ...
Southport Lib Dem members and friends had a great time at the Norwood Ward Barbecue last Saturday. The event was hosted by Pat and David Sumner and was a huge success. Over 60 people attended and a large sum was raised for ward funds. Even the rain kept away.
An excellent letter. Unfortunately we have two major parties in the US which are increasingly inward looking and xenophobic. Anti-immigration and anti-trade are the messages of the day.
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We could be about to see a flurry of imaginative and energetic online campaigning from party candidates - at least those who are serious about wanting to be a candidate in next year’s London Mayor and the 2009 European elections. (Our candidates for the London Assembly have already been selected.) The selection rules for these contests [...]
I read with concern in Metro this morning that ‘booze wipes out smoking gains’. This chimes with my own research, which suggests that the benefit to our health which hayfever pills have brought, is being savaged by fatty treats like Boost bars. More to follow.
It is now over a month since the new smoke free legislation came into force on 1 July and it has certainly made a difference to pubs (and to the pavements outside pubs). The City Council is responsible for enforcing the law, which applies to all workplaces (not just pubs) and over 810 premises across the city were visited during July. No fixed penalties were issued to individual smokers for
Frankly this is disturbing. The excellent Hit & Run blog from Reason highlights this article from the Guardian. It details how the CPS is considering charges against Channel 4 for their Dispatches program “Undercover Mosque” which showed footage of so-called moderate Muslims preaching hatred and violence towards the inhabitants of this country. Apparently showing such hate speech [...]
Lord (Tim) Garden, Liberal Democrat Defence Spokesperson in the House of Lords, sadly passed away at end of last week. I was fortunate to have met Tim on a number of occasions, although we disagreed on a number of issues always respected each others views.
Pakistan celebrates the 60th anniversary of its independence today, followed by India tomorrow. It is impossible to approach this anniversary without great sadness for the hurried way in which Britain withdrew from India, with partition causing the biggest mass movement of people in history - some 10 million involved - plus a million dying in accompanying riots and local fighting. It was an
I rarely post about computer toys and goodies, but I have been using ecto as my blogging client for ages now and I just suddenly wondered tonight how things were going with the upgrade to ecto version 3. And lo and behold I found that this very day Adriaan has put out an alpha release of version 3 for Mac OS X. I'm a techie, and I don't mind playing around with alpha software, though it's not for everyone, but I've downloaded it and at first site it looks great. A real improvement on an already very good tool. And ...
There's been a bit of comment about the lack of Lib Dem comment about John Redwood's soon to be published report from the Tories' competitiveness commission (these commissions better hurry up and report if their ideas are going to be thoroughly discussed on Stand Up, Speak Up in time to get a manifesto written and costed for October!). So I thought I'd have a quick go. I find John Redwood a bit of an enigma. No, enigma, I said, not enema. Nor Vulcan. For he is a libertarian (not, I don't think, the "neo-con" that Polly so caustically describes him). ...
Sometimes you can become too powerful or perhaps think you are more powerful than you really are. In this situation it can be very easy to lose perspective on what is right and wrong. Getting the job done can appear to be more important than realising that the method by which you get the job done might actually have all the appearance of a lack of ethics and even, possibly, corruption. The wise person usually keeps a perspective on what the limits of their powers are. The unwise person distorts the truth, definitions and loses a sense of perspective of ...
As part of my ongoing sustainable lifestyle experiment I have made a wormery (using the blueprint in Chris Catton and James Gray's masterwork "The Incredible Heap"). It is a sort of luxury hotel for relatives of earthworms that prefer living in compost heaps. The grand plan is that these intriguing little critters will chew through vegetable waste from the kitchen and turn it into crumbly compost which is excellent for plants, instead of it ending up in landfill. Cost only £4.40, which is not bad.
Being lectured on international affairs by pop stars, authors and actors is irritating. I remember standing in a field at the Isle of Wight Festival two years ago (I think we were waiting to see Babyshambles, they were rubbish) when the famous Make Poverty History ‘click ads’ were projected on giant screens. There was an audible ripple of discontent; understandable because they were extremely trite, pious and misjudged. Many in the crowd will have regarded the decision of regulatory authorities to ban them from TV as a relief. But it must be conceded that for all those that the celebrity-led ...
Tonight's Newsnight had some coverage of the climate camp. Paul Mason managed to produce another of his infuriating bits of reporting, but at least this time I wasn't annoyed at him so much as I was at the people he was interviewing at Heathrow. Mildly annoying were some of the protesters, talking in woolly terms about "the system" as if the present economic model were wholly beyond redemption.
I was recently reading Goodbye charisma, hello new politics an article by Alastair Campbell in the Observer on Sunday August 5, 2007. | < | August 2007 | > | ||||
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