LibDem Blogs - Archived! - Saturday 19th July 2008

Class Traitor.

My mum's been away for a few days. She saw Hazel Blears (who for those of you who don't know rose through the ranks of the Labour Party in Salford in the 1980s and 90s as an angry young working class woman, only to turn into some kind of semi-mechanised spin redistribution outlet for them once she got into a cosy job as a Government Minister) in Kendals (which for those of you who don't know is a posh department store in the centre of Manchester, where you won't generally find too many angry working class girls from Salford)! It's ...

The envy of the womb

The FT had a few good articles on religion last week. Richard Tomkins took a look at the Church of England's finances and found it to be in recession. Christopher Caldwell asked more or less rhetorically why sex is such a big issue in religion today, to which Mr Cesar A. Garcia, an FT reader, (Letters, 19th July), replied that it says so in the Bible. In a few sentences he managed to wipe out

THE walk

It was the Mayor's sponsored walk today. There is a write up on his blog and on Maureen Rigg's blog to save me writing and the photos will be on the official Mayor's Blog next week. I will just add my personal bit. I was immensely proud of myself managing the 4 miles around the river, mainly thanks to friendly encouragement from fellow walkers, being sponsored at £20 a mile (although more...

Police issues and what a blooming difference

Police seem to be in the headlines this week. Seemingly we are going to be encouraged to have an elected Mayor so that they can direct the Police Force locally. I assume that is as well as cleaning the streets, delivering excellent education, joined up health and social services, getting value for money, tackling climate change, greening the environment .......... What sort of sure beings do...

Back to business ...

We're just back from a couple of weeks on holiday in the States (which sort of explains the relative lack of blog updates recently!) Back to usual updates over the next few days but, meantime, can I bore you with a few holiday snaps ...! Above : We went to New York first - here's Janet in Times Square Above : In New York for the 4th of July - despite drizzling rain that night, the fireworks were really spectacular. Above : And great to see Scotland getting promoted in the centre of New York Above : New York - ...

LDV readers say: Brown will lead Labour into the next general election

That's the overwhelming verdict of almost two-thirds of Lib Dem Voice readers, according to our recent poll asking, "Do you think Gordon Brown will get to enjoy a second anniversary as Prime Minister?" However, a fairly significant minority - 21% - dissented, taking the view that the Labour party will choose to ditch their leader [...]

Make It Happen: A Note of Caution

The Lib Dem blogosphere is buzzing with excitement about Make It Happen (pdf), which has indeed attracted some press reaction to it, as Stephen discusses. To this I just want to add my own paranoia. Here goes... Lib Dem bashers frequently claim that we try to out-Tory the Tories in Tory seats, and that we try to out-Labour Labour in Labour seats (thus giving away their own belief in the natural

Colemanballs

Because once I've popped, I can't stop... I am amused, as well as sicky-sick with disgust, to discover that Tory GLA member Brian Coleman has run up an £8,000 taxi bill over the year to March 2008. For why, because it was precisely halfway through that period that he penned this rather telling objectionable-old-Tory-plonker diatribe against my former home, the good [...]

Yarborough Forward

The next meeting of Yarborough Forward, your local neighbourhood forum will take place on Thursday 24th July at 6.00pm at the Yarrow Road Community Centre. Any resident of the Yarborough Ward who is interested in making the place a safer and better place to live is welcome to come along. Yarborough Forward is a place where residents and representatives of agencies working in the area can meet and discuss ways of working that influence the way that local services are provided in the area. Regularly attending meetings are representatives from the Police, Shoreline, Neighbourhood Wardens, local Councillors, and others. Many ...

Conservative Watford candidate arrested

Liberal Democrats in Watford have been on the receiving end of a harassment campaign since 2005 (indeed, it's over a year since I blogged about a £5,000 reward being offered by the police). Yesterday events took a dramatic turn as the Watford Observer reports: Ian Oakley, the Conservative parliamentary candidate for Watford [and councillor in Hillingdon], has [...]

The Meaning of It

After a long period of internal strife in the People's Republic while we moved house, my revival to blogging is partly inspired by The Call from the party about renewing my membership subscription ("Are you enjoying being a member of the Lib Dems?" Yesyesyes, really, honest, I will blog, I will I will I will! Poor [...]

The Mayor Strides out

Today was the first day of the Mayor's sponsored walk, raising funds for his charities (Daisy Chain and Justice First) by walking the Teesdale Way from one side of the Borough to the other. It dawned bright and clear but turned to rain in the afternoon. The walkers were undeterred however, and can be seen here emerging onto the worst part of the walk - the bit that goes through a housing estate

Time for Some Campaignin'

Election humour, US-style: Send a JibJab Sendables® eCard Today!

Ming with Zing

Former party leader Menzies Campbell was in fine fettle at the Sutton Liberal Democrats' annual garden party at Jayanta Chaterjee's home this afternoon. Ming spilled few beans about the Henley away-day Nick Clegg convened yesterday, but instead urged us all to give loving support for the wives, partners and families of MPs — a point doubtless [...]

Chance to catch me in the media on Sunday

{Appearing on Radio 4's The Westminster Hour with Carolyn Quinn} I'm on The Westminster Hour: Radio 4, 10pm, Sunday. If you miss the show you'll be able to listen again on their website. If you want to get advanced notice of my media appearances like this one, you can use the media events service at Flock Together. You've got three choices: Using this feed: or By email: register at FlockTogether and pick "Media appearances" as one of the categories of events you want to be emailed about. (If you are an existing Flock Together user you can also change ...

St Christopher's slurry seal

{poor quality pavements} The pavement of St Christopher's Close are to be resurfaced - 20 years ahead of schedule! When Cllr Edwards first asked for the work, BathNES highways warned that the Tory budget allowed for resurfacing every 70 years. As St Christopher's Close, off Minster Way, is only 50 years old, there would be a long wait. Knowing the pavement's poor state, your Lib Dem councillors persisted until the council agreed to do the work this year. The broken top surface of the pavement will be removed and replaced with a thin layer of bitumen slurry to seal the ...

So farewell then, Morrell Hall

This is more than a little parochial for me, and just a tad conservative with a small "c" - it reminds me again why little changes can deeply affect people in all sorts of ways. And whilst my own thoughts on this are probably unprintable, and not only because the decision has been made by those who are my employer and landlord and I don't really want to find myself sleeping under a hedge next week, I cannot let this little bit of Oxford's history disappear without some commemoration... {Headington Hill Hall, the second grand house on the site built ...

A Liberal Democrat pilgrimage

Catholics have Lourdes or Santiago de Compostela, Anglicans have Canterbury and Hindus have Varanasi, all of which are perfectly charming, I'm sure. Liberal Democrats have Hebden Bridge, the font of cutting-edge campaigning ideas since Tony Greaves was a lad. I've only been there once, nearly twenty years ago for a LYMEC seminar on Tourism. The sun shone, the Timothy Taylor's Landlord was

Following Labour on our local radar

We were out delivering our next Focus for the byelection in Whickham South and Sunniside this morning. And that's when I started to get the calls from people who were tracking Labour across the ward. It was like having them on a radar screen. Our opponents were out delivering a letter to postal voters. It is so far their only literature of the campaign. I predicted they would get a leaflet out

Good news on school places

Hurrah - my Liberal Democrat council colleagues have at last managed to get Haringey Council to hold a consultation on whether to expand Rhodes Avenue Primary school. In May 2007 Councillor Gail Engert (Muswell Hill ward) revealed a shocking primary school place 'black hole' - out of the 110 children across all of Haringey who did not receive any of their four school preferences for a reception place, 25 came from Alexandra ward alone. (It's only one out of nineteen wards, but more than one of five of the children without one of the four choices came from there.) The ...

NEW POLL: do you think Margaret Thatcher was a good or bad thing for Britain?

A story LDV didn't get round to covering this week was the Mail on Sunday's suggestion that Margaret Thatcher is to be honoured when she dies with a state funeral, the first British Prime Minister since Winston Churchill to be afforded such an honour. This prompted a flurry of commentary from friends and foes taking [...]

Things that Caught My Eye in the EW ComicCon preview, and some Trek!Crack

You can click through to the Entertainment Week article here. First up on the excitement scale is page 4 of the article: NEW TREK! OMGWTFBBQYAAAAAAAAY! Is it bad that I think Kirk is quite hot there? I really want to see this now. And Zach looks WAY better as Spock than he did as Sylar. Then comes Dollhouse (pp. 5 and 6). I like Eliza Dushku, and am still undecided as to whether to be excited or worried about this. Dr. Horrible is leaning me towards worried, if I'm honest. League of Extraordinary Gentlemen III starts at page 13. I ...

An end to snap general elections?

A welcome suggestion, in line with what the Liberal Democrats have previously called for, from the Electoral Commission in one of its new reports: The prime minister should give more than a month's notice if he is calling a general election, a watchdog has suggested in a report. The Electoral Commission recommends extending the parliamentary election [...]

Latest on Labour's financial woes

Today's Independent brings the news that: Labour is to delay repaying its "cash for honours" loans for up to a decade as it attempts to plug a £16m black hole in its finances... Accounts due to be published at the end of this month will show the party still has a net deficit of £16m and will [...]

Local events

After a bumper crop of events in July, things now seem to be winding down as people go off on holiday. This is the latest list from E-Focus. The next meeting of FUSS is at 7pm on Tuesday 19th August at the Church of the Good Shepherd. Lewisham Homes will have a 'Summer Roadshow' on the Northbrook & Cordwell Estate (off Northbrook Road) from 10am until 1pm on Friday 22nd August. This is part of a series of roadshows being held across the borough. Activities at the roadshows include DJing, beat boxing, drama workshops, football, film, sculpting, face painting, bouncy ...

Lee Station Yard - planning meeting

New homes have been built on the site of the former Lee Station Yard - the road now known as Glenmere Row. One of the conditions of the planning permission was that a plan was submitted for future maintenance of the embankment (including slope stability measures). The Council has now received a revised scheme involving re-grading of the slope. A meeting is being held to discuss the plans at 7.00pm on Monday 28th July 2008 at the show house 11 Glenmere Row, first house after the Block 1 flats. I'll try and make it along.

Crime down - ZOMG CONSPIRCY

My God, Labour have done it again. Even though EVERYONE KNOWS that crime is SOARING because we read it in the newspapers ALL THE TIME, Gordon Brown and Jacqui Smith have managed to pull the wool over peoples' eyes again! The Police are saying that they are recording FEWER crimes than last year. This is obviously because the Police are lying! Why would you trust a policeman to know what a crime is? After all, the Police LOVE the government because they've been given such a big pay rise this year! What's more, Labour have also managed to stop the ...

Tax cuts? You must be joking!

We have known for some time that the Liberal Democrats have advocated tax cuts for those on low incomes. The idea was that there would be a shift in the burden of taxation towards those on higher incomes and those who pollute (ie green taxes). As a progressive I am OK with that, although I am not sure that tax cuts are the most efficient way to help the poor. Many pay little or no tax to begin with. The holding position of the party on the overall tax take was to keep it at the current level, until we ...

Dr Horrible - Joss Whedon is a Naked Emperor.

Am I alone in thinking this is pants? Maybe I'm in the wrong mood... It's trite and the music is rubbish. It was horrendously slow to start and when it DID get going it failed to hold my attention for any length of time. There are some good jokes, and I liked the damp guy, and Nathan Fallon is clearly enjoying himself (with his Captain Hammer Pointy Nipples) but there's nothing original and lots of stuff that just made me cringe. Doogie Howser singing and failing to impress a girl is brilliant? C'mon, you guys.... And don't even get me ...

Don't be a burglary - victim, lock your doors!

Residents are being urged to lock their doors and windows after a huge increase in burglaries. Police say recent appeals to the public to protect their property have "fallen on deaf ears" Burglaries North East Lincolnshire have almost doubled in the last two weeks - with almost half of thieves entering through insecure doors or windows. There have also been several instances in the Yarborough Ward over the last few weeks Last Sunday alone, three homes were burgled after intruders entered through insecure doors. And on Tuesday, a thief entered a home in Immingham through an insecure conservatory window and ...

What happens to your tips at Hard Rock Cafe?

Spotted this story on the BBC website. It seems that Hard Rock Cafe pay their waiters as little as £2.06 an hour, well under half the £5.52 minimum wage. The way they get around this is by using tips paid by customers to push pay up above the minimum level - which apparently is perfectly legal. Funnily enough, £2.06 an hour is exactly what I got paid in my first weekend job at a national chain of newsagents - boosted to a handsome £3.09 as I worked on Sundays and got paid time and a half. But that was some ...

Scary 'Make it Happen' Lady!

I have a million and one things to do this morning. I have to moan at BT, do my laundry and book my practical driving test amongst other things, so why did I end up downloading 'Make it Happen', the new policy document from Nick? It's been quite possibly the most wasted 20 minutes I've spent in a long time. Where have those 20 minutes gone? Can I claim them back for time misspent? Oh, and now I'm blogging about it, so a 40 minute refund please... Despite the bright pictures busily wasting paper and ink when the document is ...

Tories gain on Redditch Borough and Worcestershire County

Thursday saw two by-elections in the West Midlands on Redditch Borough Council and Worcestershire County Council.The Conservatives gained both from Labour.

Mum commits suicide over threat of care proceedings

What is unusual about this story is that it has some publicity. There is anecdote, but not research about the number of suicides linked to care proceedings. It later emerged Mrs Bell feared her younger children, aged from nine to 15, would be taken away after she was arrested for an alleged assault. In her note she said she loved them all and would never forget them.

Housing for Oxford: Labour misses the opportunity

So, Ms Blears announced, like the Fairy Godmother to Cinderella, that Oxford can have an urban extension. People will rush to fight over whether south of Grenoble Road is the best place to build, but in scrambling to do so, they'll miss the bigger issue. What has been announced, from what I have seen, is that an estate of 4,000 houses, 40% of them affordable, can be built in that area. If Andrew Smith imagines that that is anywhere near large enough even to dent substantially the housing crisis this city and this county faces, he just doesn't appreciate the ...

A serious misjudgement

With Rhodri Glyn Thomas' demise as a Government Minister the media is full of speculation that he will stand down in 2011 so as to allow Adam Price to assume his 'natural' role as Plaid Cymru leader. If Mr. Price does get that opportunity then he will need to exercise better political judgement than this. Holding the referendum on the same day as the Assembly elections would guarantee a 'no' vote in my opinion. A combined poll would fragment the support for greater powers and polarise opinion. It would also lead to key players in all parties failing to campaign ...

And then there were three

First we had Huw Lewis and Leighton Andrews addressing meetings of party activists to outline their political philosophy, now they have been joined by Carwyn Jones. It cannot be long before Andrew Davies is on the leadership trail with them. The smokers amongst them (and I believe there is only one) need to be careful where they indulge their habit over the next 12 months.

Daily Politico

Want to know about my most embarrassing political moment (knickers come into it), or my earliest political memory (the Communist candidate won)..? I was asked those and many other questions this week for the Daily Politico page on Total Politics

Second largest man in the world?

Yep, it's back to that Kilburn mural - one of the more impressive pieces of street art around. A full insight into the mural and the project indeed can be found here http://www.signalproject.com/kilburn/ But this little pic capture the podium statue of one of Kilburn's legendary characters, William Thomas Ecclestone. He was famed for his cheer and his size and became quite simply 'Jolly Jumbo'. He had previously been landlord of the Coach and Horses in Stonebridge before taking over the Canterbury Arms in Kilburn. Presumbly near Canterbury Road, just down from the currently Kilburn Park Tube station. William died ...

Oh no!

So now smoking in a pub is such an image disaster for a politician it constitutes a reason to resign? I'm never going to make it... {Photobucket} Oh no, I forgot - that's me two years ago, before the ban came in. Phew, that's alright then!

And now a look at what Labour's candidate has said

Elaine Dobson is the Labour candidate in the Whickham South and Sunniside by-election on 31st July. She made a number of claims last year which she has failed in substantiate. .So here are some of the amazing claims she has made.In an election leaflet edited by Mrs Dobson in spring last year, she spun a story that Whickham School was about to be rebuilt. The leaflet said that 'building work may

Saturday 19th July 2008

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