Parliamentary by-elections have often been the lifeblood of the Liberal Democrats and the party’s predecessors. Had David Alton not won Liverpool Edge Hill in 1979, for example, the Liberal Pary might well have gone down the pan. That point was made (more elegantly) by (Lord) David Steel tonight, at a dinner at the National Liberal [...] 
Nadine Dorries MP and Stewart Jackson MP both reckon that Bob Spink will join UKIP, becoming that party's first MP. Writing on her blog, Ms Dorries says: Stewart Jackson MP and I chewed over the meaning of this in about 30 seconds. Spink will, we think, given his strong anti Euro views and Essex seat, join UKIP - bad move!
I suppose I should be flattered that the Welsh Language magazine, Golwg cannot resist referring to me in their gossip column, but I really wish they would get their facts right. This week they suggest that I had to be pushed and cajoled into signing a Statement of Opinion tabled by my colleague, Jenny Randerson, congratulating Cardiff City Football Club on their success in reaching the FA Cup semi-finals. On the contrary, as the record shows, I signed it at the first opportunity and had no problem doing so. Despite supporting the Swans, I am more than happy to celebrate ...
I went to the local branch meeting of the Liberal Democrat party.. It was in some guy's living room. There were eight of us there; one guy who's a campaigns dude from Calderdale party central (he actually gets paid to work for the party) and one local councillor (who defected to us from the tories because he couldn't take the way the tories do things any more) and six bog standard members, including me and Mat. Mat asked the party central dude how many armchair members there were in the area, you know, the type that never turn up to ...
Brian Paddick was absolutely right in his condemnation of Ken Livingstones insane policy to destroy Londons skyline with tall, inhuman, glass monuments to the vanity of architects and the greed of corporations. I was pleased and relieved that he did, having wondered rather what he thought on the issue. But why do politicians, and Liberal Democrats in particular, leave themselves so open to the charge of empty-headed bandwagon-jumping If we just say we agree with the furore about tall buildings, will anyone remember Of course not. If they do remember, will they believe it derives from a distinctively Lib Dem ...
So, ive been in New York for he last few days, and have had an amazing time. I'll write about what i got up to, sometime in the next fewdays, but for now here are a few photos from the trip;
BBC News at 10 is reporting that MPs will have to publish a list of all their expense claims going back over recent years. It follows the publication of what MPs can claim for their second home; apparently, MPs can claim up to £750 for TVs and £10,000 for new kitchens. The move, which has come about following requests through the Freedom of Information system, will further damage the reputation of MPs. It will provide a media frenzy that will no doubt bring down more MPs from public office. Of course, there are bad eggs, and fraud and corruption should ...
Peter Hain is in the news again, warning that the One Wales Government needs to shape up by ploughing more investment into private companies or risk losing out to India and China. He has told BBC Wales that the Welsh government has given too much priority to spending money on public services: Mr Hain said ministers have tended in the past to focus most of their effort and investment on the public services and schemes like free prescriptions and breakfasts. He said: "I was happy about free prescriptions and the latest decision about free hospital parking. Everybody likes that. None ...
The agenda for the meeting of the Selly Oak Constituency Committee on Tuesday 18 March 2008 has now been published and is available online. The meeting will be held at 7pm in the Brandwood Centre, 157 Allens Croft Road, Kings Heath, Birmingham. Items on the agenda include: Planning Enforcement;an update on Community Safety;an update on the Neighbourhood Advice and Information Service;a report
Liverpool is a building site, much of the building being at sea level. Pity it will be submerged in 50 years, at the rate we are going in melting the polar ice with our not-so-clever, climate-wrecking inventions. The city is also the home of the International Slavery Museum which I visited last Sunday. I particularly remember an engraving of a scene in which a man is branding a woman captive with a hot iron. She twists to look up at him in terror and bewilderment, as animals also do, when people are cruel to them. There was also movie footage ... 
Contrary to popular belief, I don’t think Ed Balls did say “so what” during Cameron’s Budget response yesterday. Here’s the video, kindly supplied by Guido Fawkes: Due to the poor quality and fact a mike isn’t switched on near him, you can’t make out what Ed Balls said, however in the reaction shot that the cameras [...]
The call for a move away from first past the post has been ongoing for almost 100 years, the 1917 all-party Speaker's Conference recommended a switch to a Single Transferable Vote system in the cities and large towns and the use of the Alternative Vote method in the counties, these proposals failed. Again in 1931, under the second Labour government, a bill introducing AV got through the House of Commons but was rejected in the Lords. Returning to more recent history after the 1983 election in which the Liberal Democrats (then Liberal-SDP Alliance) polled only 675,985 votes behind the Labour ...
Detained for signing a petition...
Former Liberal Democrat leader Charles Kennedy is one of the panellists on tonights Question Time (broadcast on BBC1 and online from 10.35 pm GMT). The panel will also include the First Minister of Scotland Alex Salmond, Conservative shadow chancellor George Osborne, Innovation, Universities and Skills secretary John Denham, and businesswoman Nicola Horlick. If youre watching, and want [...]
Almost 36 hours have passed since Alistair Darling presented his first Budget. It is usually around this time that budgets that initially appear wonderful begin to unravel or those that on the face of it look rather insignificant have something more meaty about them. It is the time when the boffins from the Institute of Financial Studies have had the opportunity to consider the small print of the budget book and to highlight those parts which the Chancellor chose not to mention in his speech. So 36 hours on, whats the assessment Well, it really does look as though the ...
My wife has been watching Jamie Oliver this evening whilst I mark books, but despite my concentration being mostly on my books, I cannot help myself from shouting out expletives at Jamie Oliver every so often. His annoying obsession with referring to "herbs" as "herbage" makes me wonder if he also has "shittage" when he goes to the toilet and "sleepage" when he goes to bed each night, no doubt pre-empted by "shaggage". Whilst his obsession with saying "look at that little baby" or "turn that baby over" makes me what to shout "it's a lamb chop for Christ's sake, ...
Back in June 2007, when Ed Balls was appointed secretary of state for Children, Schools and Families, I did suggest he might come a cropper some day: Ill be interested to see how long it is before Balls tone-deaf touch lands the Government in hot water.That day came on Wednesday, with his heckling of David Camerons budget response, when it is alleged he shouted So what when the Tory leader
Hooray. You can now become a “fan” of the Liberal Democrats on Facebook. Finally, that gaping void in my heart can be filled. As well as fanning the flames of Liberal Democracy, you can also install the Facebook Lib Dem application, and join the group. You can poke proportionally more Lib Dem MPs than MPs from any [...]
Tonight, I get home to receive notification that next week’s full council is cancelled. I would like to believe it is because of increasing pressure from the Lib Dems on correct procedure for reports for Council, my colleague Ian Radford has been increasingly vocal on this issue. I think that probably is because its Maundy Thursday and that a lot of the Tories will be on their Easter break.
A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the story - originating with Dominic Lawson - that: Baroness Williams of Crosby and former leader of the LibDems in the House of Lords, had threatened to resign and rejoin the Labour Party, unless Ming Campbell likewise abandoned the dangerous policy of giving the British people a vote on the Lisbon treaty. The artificial and insincere idea of offering us instead a vote on 'in or out of the EU' was Ming Campbell's way of wriggling out of the Liberal Democrats' commitment to a vote on the amended constitutional treaty without making ... 
Its a month since Lib Dem Voice found that the BBCs Question Time is “officially pro-Tory”, with considerably more Conservative-aligned panellists than Labour, let alone the Lib Dems. (We even produced the obligatory bar-chart as conclusive proof.) As promised, we emailed the BBC with the link to our story, and have today received their reply: Dear [...]
Writing for The First Post, Alexander Cockburn thinks so - "above and beyond his own diligent efforts in the same cause". Cockburn says: It is clear that the federal investigators' probe started with Spitzer, not the prostitution ring. Spitzer's bank wire transfers led them to the Emperors Club, the call-girl business efficiently administered by a 23-year-old Blair Academy grad, Cecil Suwal, on behalf of her 62-year-old boyfriend, Mark Brener, from a high-rise in Cliffside Park, New Jersey, with fine views of Manhattan.And tonight's Snowmail from Channel 4 News gets very excited about the affair too: Elsewhere, the ripples from the ...
I was intrigued by the article in today's Scotsman about a study which showed that women who gave up smoking during pregnancy were more likely to have good natured babies. I quit a longstanding and heavy smoking habit the minute I saw a positive pregnancy test and I ended up with the world's easiest baby. I hadn't really considered that the two might be connected. Even now, she is generally sunny rather than stormy and a real pleasure to be around. Unsurprisingly, the study reveals that babies whose mothers continued smoking were more likely to have babies who cried more ...
Is Duffy's "Mercy" a cover version of an old song
There was some very good news for residents of Eastern Avenue and Hamilton Road today. The planned development of five flats on the land that used to be leased for garages has been rejected. This is thanks to many local residents, the Sutton Community Association, and Reading Liberal Democrats (including myself, and Cllrs. Bayes and Benson). The development was rejected on the following grounds: - Loss of privacy and overbearing impact on neighbouring properties in Eastern Avenue and Hamilton Road - It would harm the character and appearance of the South Park Conservation Area because of its ...
I'm hugely relieved to see that the Home Secretary has agreed to review the case of Mehdi Kazemi whose threatened deportation to Iran puts him at risk of torture and execution. My colleague, the indefatigable Roger Roberts, was collecting signatures in the Lords yesterday petitioning for Mehdi to stay in the UK. Whilst I was only too pleased to add my name, I was disappointed, to say the least, not a single Conservative could be persuaded to do so. What sort of society have we when a vulnerable young man has to appeal to the Netherlands judiciary because he can't ...
It is, for me, an utter disgrace that Hansard, supposedly the official record of everything that is said in the House of Commons (and Lords) can actually be doctored, altered and whitewashed to protect an Minister who so out of his depth started shouting abuse across the chamber in manner so unbefitting a Minister that it must have been an embarrassment even to his Labour colleagues. What was clear to me from watching Ed Balls reaction to David Cameron was that he was not saying "so weak" , he was clearly, in my view repeating "so what" to Mr Cameron ...
A very rare siting indeed - news arrives today that a species, once thought to be extinct in urban Britain, has been seen walking the streets of Tyneside. Conservative dodos, long extinct in Gateshead and Newcastle, have been seen on local streets. Is this an attempt to repopulate the area with the species Alas, it is not to be. The Conservative dodo has taken up only a temporary roost in the
Do you rent a house from a private landlord if the answer is yes then the advice issued by Bath & North East Somerset Council that I have posted below may be of help to you. If you do not live in Bath & North East Somerset then please contact your own council for any further advice that you may need but the basic principles of this new allowance may still apply to you if in doubt...
I’ve been a member of the North Staffs Rail Promotion Group for several years now and there can be no doubt that much of the credit for the return of a stoppping service at Stone Station later this year is due to the hard work of this group. Last night’s meeting in Stone Station was a good example of the type of work they do. We heard that stations on the Crewe - Stoke - Derby line would all soon have electronic passenger information boards; that representations were being made to include a late service into Stoke and that the ...
From the BBC: Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg is calling for the number of MPs in the House of Commons to be cut by 150. This would save taxpayers millions of pounds and cut political parties’ need to raise cash from big donors, he says. In a speech setting out his proposals for re-building trust in politics he [...]
The Scottish Parliament's Local Government Committee has just published it's report on concerns over the Scottish Government's behaviour regarding Donald Trump's proposed $1 Billion golf development in Aberdeenshire. Committee Convener, Duncan MacNeill MSP, suggested that: "The committee believes that, far from taking a precautionary approach, the first minister was cavalier in his actions and displayed, at best, exceptionally poor judgement and a worrying lack of awareness about the consequence of his actions" The BBC reports that Several SNP committee members disagreed with a series of its conclusions. Quite frankly I would be astonished if any Gnats didn't back their heid ...
News today that the Ethiopian national Bank is to inspect all the gold in it's vaults after the discovery that some "gold" ingots were actually gold plated steel. It seems that the problem only came to light when the Ethiopian bank sent some ingots to South Africa who promptly sent them back saying that they were fake. A number of arrests have since been made including a gold trader, officials from the National Bank and officials from the Ethiopian Geological Survey. The fraud is expected to have cost the country millions of dollars and there are serious worries that considerably ...
The BBC are reporting: “Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg is calling for the number of MPs in the House of Commons to be cut by 150. This would save taxpayers millions of pounds and cut political parties’ need to raise cash from big donors, he says.” At first glance, this looks like a worrying way of bring [...]
I was lucky to grow up in a quiet little village. On one side the village is straddled by an air strip and Cranfield University. The Uni is postgraduate and as a result takes in a lot of foreign students - over a third of a 4,000 population. As a result in [...]
The linked story is about the two men currently imprisoned as a result of care proceedings in various ways. These are not the only really weird things happening, but they are some that have escaped from the secrecy of the Family Courts.
The London Child Poverty Commission recently called for a government minister to be appointed, solely to battle the poverty which holds back Londons least advantaged children. Sounds odd but I suppose that whilst we still elect MPs like Liam Fox, who think that poverty is just boring, eye-catching demands are a neccesity. The Commission found that a genuinely shocking 41% of all children in London live below the poverty line, and set out a series of proposals for tackling the situation some sensible, some less so. The sting of poverty is felt especially sharply in London, where the high cost ...
There has been an awful lot of noise but very little light on the Euro referendum issue. A lot of the public support the Lib Dem idea of a referendum on whether or not to stay in the EU. But it all masks what the debate is actually supposed to be about: the Treaty of Lisbon. Which of course serves the interests of both Tories and Labour since they are, as always, split on the subject. Most
I agree with every word. support and politics. The choice is clear: More of the same from Hillary - for those who think the only way to tackle the Repubs is to act like them - or a real chance for change with Obama.
Lord Goldsmith would like schoolchildren to swear an oath of allegiance to better define our sense of Britishness. Poor unfortunate children are to be made to swear the oath to Queen and country (presumably); one wonders if the new ‘citizens’ will get a certificate or baseball cap to celebrate their inclusion. This is the worse [...]
The MoD spends almost quarter of a million pounds per month renting private housing for 100 members of MoD top brass and their families, figures uncovered by the Liberal Democrats show. Parliamentary answers reveal: The 50 most expensive privately rented family homes cost the taxpayer almost £124,000 in total every month, whilst the 50 most expensive single accommodation homes cost an additional £110,000 per month. The MoD currently spends £30m per year on 7,000 empty family homes around the UK. Private family accommodation for senior officers costs up to £4,200 per family per month. Private individual accommodation for senior officers ...
In his post earlier today Mark Pack reported on how Shirley Williams has said that she 'never threatened to defect to Labour on any issue or at any time since I helped to found the Lib Dem party. I'm sorry Mark and Shirley, Im not convinced. Despite everything thats been said, I still can't help thinking there may well be an element of truth behind the original story Why do I say that I have to ask myself; why has it taken Shirley until now to put the record straight. She must have been aware of the story when it ...
I see there is another by-election on Suffolk County Council in Stowmarket North. It is only a few months that the Tory was elected there in another by election. I hope that those people that voted Labour or Green last time will have the sense to back the Lib Dem Nicky Turner to remove yet another Tory from Suffolk County Council. Last time the Tory won with just 31% of the vote. This mean spirited Tory administration has imposed charges on the elderly and infirm and introduced uncertainty into the education of our children. I hope we wont have to ...
I invited the Friends of the Bath International Music Festival to the Parlour to say a Big Thank You' to them for their continued support over the many years that the Music Festival has been going you may be amazed that it has been on the go for 60years' so many of our Mayors of Bath have seen the events and enjoyed them Then Later, The Mayor and Charter Trustees and the...
I'm pleased to see the City Council taking a very active role in promoting its Mobile Phone Recycling Week, running until 16th March. During Mobile Phone Recycling Week, residents can recycle their old mobile phones at Dundee City Council libraries (including Blackness Library) and the reception area of Tayside House. The money which will be raised by recycling your old mobiles will be donated to the Children's Hospice Association Scotland. You can read more by clicking on the headline above.
This article articulates my reaction to the BBC's "white season" - that it seemed, like the tabloid press, to hype fears by failing to address the real causes of a genuine problem. That is to say, immigration is not to blame for the pressure on public services etc. (He omits to be blunt about who is to blame. Since the gap between rich and poor has widened under Labour, it should be obvious!) As
All right - I was wrong about Lembit on the Sports Relief Celebrity Apprentice. He wasn't eaten alive by Sir Alan and he didn't lock horns with Kelvin MacKenzie. In fact, Lembit was a conciliatory and calming chair who managed to help the men's group recover from two hours of arguing to achieve a respectable income from their project. This programme was a text book example of how women get on
Yesterday Iain Dale interviewed me about Prime Minister's Questions and the Budget for Friction.TV. You can watch the result here - it was just a bit windy!
Ive found myself returning to the budget with a bit more interest mostly as a result of the media coverage. Some headlines and comments from the Tories got my thinking: Budget 2008: Alistair Darling’s strike against the family motorist ( Telegraph) Alistair Darling to hit family cars with £2,000 tax (Times) “Instead of the government helping people [...]
Liberal Burblings has done it, the Belsize Liberal Democrats have done it and even Cllr Fraser Macpherson has done it. So, why on earth shouldnt Jeremy Browne MP do it What am I on about Passing comment on the budget of course! To be honest, its hard to think of anyone more qualified than Jeremy to pass comment on the budget. He is after all, the Lib Dem Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury (in effect Vince Cable's Number 2). Anyhow, here's this weeks column, have a read, see if you agree or disagree and let me know if his ...
On Monday 3rd March I visited the University to attend and help Open the Bath Islamic Society's Awareness Week Exhibition To Know Each Other' with Pro Vice Chancellor, Professor Ian Jamieson first time this has happened and I think it is important that we learn about other cultures as well as our own. A Visit to a school Southdown Infants one of my old schools but I was...
According to the BBC, plans are afoot for a new Carry On film, to be in cinemas later this year. The original Carry On films were some of the most entertaining ever. I went to a film festival at the Barbican on the 1990s where the Carry On films were shown on the big screen once again. It was a glorious event as 300 people sat giggling in anticipation of jokes we all knew were coming up. If any film is funnier that Carry On Up The Khyber, I'd like to see it because I cannot watch that film without ...
I've written more than a few times before about my views on the behaviour of MPs at set-piece events like Prime Minister's Questions (in short: abysmal!). Well - it looks as if Ed Balls at least may have got his comeuppance - being accused all over the media of shouting "so what" when Cameron was speaking in the budget debate about the high levels of taxes under Labour. Not exactly a clever thing! I understand his defence is that he actually said "so weak" - but in the end if you live by the sword, you die by the sword ...
I quote, in all its full glory, paragraph 6.33 of Enterprise: unlocking the UK’s talent, the ”Enterprise Strategy” published as part of yesterday’s Budget : Transparency and easy access to R&D contract opportunities is essential. To ensure co-advertising, a link will be put in place between the TSB website and www.supply2.gov.uk. This will enable maximum exposure for [...]
Heres a contender for my first rule of politics. If a party tries to win votes by producing a long list of policies, disappointment, if not disaster, is just around the corner. A sad case study is the Liberal Democrats 2005 general election manifesto. The ten reasons to vote Liberal Democrat just didnt cut the mustard. But this is about more than just manifestos its a whole approach to politics thats going wrong for liberals and the left nearly everywhere. The leading US Democratic Party strategist James Carville said in 2006 that: The central Democratic problem is that we lack ...
There was some speculation around the European referendum vote in Parliament that Shirley Williams had threatened to defect to Labour if the party didn’t oppose a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. Shirley has a letter in today’s Times which is a very fulsome a rebuttal of those claims, including this bit: I have never threatened to defect [...]
This was an honour to present Long Service Badges for the Royal British Legion to their volunteers who take part in the Poppy Appeal and have done so for many years, and hopefully for many years to come. And I would like to take this opportunity to thank the people of Bath that buy the poppy's in support they raised over £35 thousand. Then I get a day off . Oh! I do get...
I am triple-booked tonight, on what is a busy night for Council and community meetings in Prestwich, and so we have had to re-jig our diaries to make sure that there is Lib Dem representation at all of the events taking place this evening. The one Im going to is at the Town Hall, and is the latest meeting of the Performance and Resources Overview and Scrutiny Commission. Tonights meeting is a specially arranged one to discuss a decision of the Executive that has been called in for extra scrutiny. It relates to the proposed establishment of a new ...
Wild Places: This was Christopher Somerville with his sister Julia Somerville And it was rather interesting they were talking about his life and his travels and the book he wrote with more detail in it. Across Crete and why he went the way he did, and I'm sure the book is well worth reading. I enjoyed this and so did my two visitors Kornel Karsay from Kaposvar and Peter...
Do you display the party’s campaign buttons or Liberal Democrat TV feed on your own website or blog If you are displaying them, here’s your chance to advertise your site and get an extra link. We’re going to start listing on www.libdems.org.uk sites which are using the buttons and/or feed, so if they appear on your [...]
"Community Spirit" - a new community group for the "north" part of West End Ward, covering Ancrum, Pentland and the Cleghorn area launches tonight (Thursday 13th March) at the Mitchell Street Centre (6pm for 6.15pm). All local residents are invited. A number of local residents in the area have been involved in developing a community group, assisted by Dundee City Council staff and local councillors. Following a successful initial public meeting at Balgay Church Hall last October, tonight's meeting will see the group formally established. I have produced an update newsletter for the meeting covering various local issues - you ...
Coming upon yet another street flood, towards which remedial work is only now getting under way, the further delay to the new health centre must come as a virtual kick in the teeth to Briton Ferry Residents. It was clear at last year's AGM of the Health Board that the Briton Ferry centre was the top priority in the Neath Port Talbot area, and that necessary health service developments in other parts of the country borough were not being considered in any detail. It appeared that the plans were then set in stone, and that preparatory work was imminent.
You couldnt make it up. The Telegraphs headline summed it up best: MP loses whip in row over wife, lover and her daughter. Where do the Tories find their MPs from Following shortly on the heels of the resignation of Derek Conway (for misusing public funds to subsidise his son through university) and Andrew Pelling (who was arrested on suspicion of assaulting his wife), Dr Bob Spink, the Honourable Member for Castle Point, outdoes them both. Not only does Spink employ his ex-wife as constituency diary secretary (despite the fact she lives 200 miles away) and their daughter, the House ...
Well that was a damp squib for anyone hoping for a green budget. Here are the headlines: A change from air passenger duty to a tax on planes but no curb on airport expansion which will guarantee that we can't meet our CO2 reduction targets.£26m to help homes become greener - that's about a pound per UK household!A law to make supermarkets charge for plastic bags by 2009 if they don't do it themselves - just as communities all over the country are introducing voluntary bans.£950 on the price of a new gas guzzler but no curb on roads expansion ...
At present plans are afoot, as part of the City Councils Master plan, to demolish the Great Northern Hotel.To date the, the Conservative Cabinet have simply but forward empty phrases and has failed to provide the necessary formal guarantees. You can sign the petition to stop this at: http://www.campaigns.libdems.org.uk/GreatNorthernHotelThe Great Northern Hotel is owned by local entrepreneur and city businessman Peter Boizot. Peter has vowed to fight the plans to the bitter end, in a bid to save the Victorian Hotel. The Great Northern Hotel has stood opposite the railway station since 1849.The Chief Executive of Opportunity Peterborough, has already ...
In the Surrey Comet's Gossip Onlooker section this week, I spotted the story from my blog about the Lib Dem couple who met through their blogs. But I then noticed an even odder item about loos in the Guildhall - and the penny dropped! (Couldn't resist that....) On the first floor of the Guildhall there are two toilets with the original 1930s panels proclaiming them for the...
There is a case for taking stories about rifts in the One Wales Government with a large pinch of salt. After all it is in the interests of both sides to play up differences now and again and to take a particularly macho stance so as to keep their more sceptical supporters on board and to give them some room for manoeuvre in their campaigning. I am not therefore taking this latest spat between Plaid Cymru and Labour over the referendum on full law-making powers for the Assembly very seriously. Nevertheless it does cast a light on the tensions between ...
Perhaps youre going to watch one of the big sporting matches - Arsenal vs. Middlesborough or England vs. Ireland No Perhaps youre planning a shopping trip to the West End, cinema, or theatre No Perhaps youre planning on staying at home, putting your feet up and watching TV Whatever, you're planning on doing why not cancel your plans and come along to Trafalgar Square instead What for Well, let me tell you. At 12 o clock on Saturday 15th March 2008, scores of people from all across the country, will be meeting up to take part in whats hoped to ...
On way to work after another early morning start - it's polling day today in Queen's Park and Kensal Rise. A team of us from Haringey have been over to help our Lib Dem colleagues deliver their 'good morning' leaflets to remind local residents that today's the day to vote. Good to see my long-time friend and colleague - and at the next general election, MP for Hampstead & Kilburn - Ed Fordham there, coordinating the campaign. It was very close indeed between the Lib Dems and Labour at the last election, so hopefully there will be a good turnout. ...
The Administrators moved in at Raydale Park home of SPL side Gretna yesterday and within hour they announced that unless £30,000 was forthcoming by lunchtime today the club would go out of business. All through their progression through the league they were living the dream, but it appears they were also living in a dream world and not basing themselves on reality. Bills have gone unpaid and
It should be easier to phone Essex police now when you have a non-urgent query. The new number is 0300 333 4444. This is one of the new numbers that begin 03: they are charged at the same rate as 'landline' 01245- / 020- numbers, so it is included in inclusive minutes packages from phone companies. (Further explanation on the police website.) Well done Essex Police for keeping costs down for | < | March 2008 | > | ||||
| S | M | T | W | T | F | S |
| 1 | ||||||
| 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 |
| 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 |
| 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 |
| 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 |
| 30 | 31 | |||||
