RT @radioriel Today on Radio Riel we take you back to the years of WWII http://tinyurl.com/lz2a7w [wonderful music & interesting story] # Have written up our visit to #F1 Silverstone yesterday here http://bit.ly/staof – really interesting day on a lot of different levels #
Today's ComRes poll puts Labour on just 22%, the Tories are on 39% and we're on 18%. If Mandelson is loopy enough to back Brown right through an election campaign, expect the LibDems to come second in vote share. Brown will lose votes every time he opens his mouth and Nick could expect to make major headway as a "first election" third-party leader, especially given his easy TV manner. It's up to Mandelson now. The Cabinet and the PLP have both castrated themselves with a blunt and rusty knife. I hope the Prince of Darkness has lost his marbles and ...
Ever since I moved to Market Harborough in 1973 I have been passing the Triangular Lodge on the train and thinking "I must visit it one day". Today I did. Rushton Triangular Lodge was built in the 1590s by Sir Thomas Tresham, who had been imprisoned for his Roman Catholic beliefs. It is dominated by the number three, which is symbolic of the Holy Trinity. It has three storeys and three walls, each thirty-three feet long and with three windows and three gables. The exterior also features biblical quotations together with numbers; some of the numbers remain mysterious in their ...
New ComRes Poll has the following results: CON 39(+1) LAB 22(nc) LD 18 (-2) Personally I think the Labour result will be a massive blow to Labour HQ who would have thought that the strong leadership and sort of unity created by Brown after the elections would have helped them but clearly it hasn't. Get rid of Brown and bring on Johnson is my message. The Tories will be enjoying their result which would give them a nice outcome if they were to get that at the polls when ever the general election might be. The Lib Dems at Cowley ...
Is someone at the Salford Labour Party in denial? The local branch's website has blocked any reference to the troubles of its local MP Hazel Blears, after some apparently disparaging remarks. "This site has been set up for issues relating to local government in Salford City," it says primly. "It is accepted that currently matters [...]
Yes, I know it's the same one as posted earlier, courtesy of Nickie, but since then I've seen a tweet from someone who said he'd overheard a conversation at the British Grand Prix at Silverstone to the effect that broadcasters had been politely requested by the powers that be not to show Max Out banners. If that's true, then it's pathetic. It's also very stupid, because it only draws attention to the whole thing. If you've been to Silverstone with any sort of anti FIA/Max material, take a photo and send it to me at caronsmusingsatgooglemaildotcom and I will happily ...
Birmingham's beach (no, not the one at Spaghetti Junction!) is back for another summer. Sponsored by Monarch and BRMB, the beach will be open for sun-seekers (we can hope...) from this weekend right up until ArtsFest in September. The Council says the beach provides "an idyllic urban oasis for city centre workers and visitors to relax". When I was there today there were distinctly below-par Spanish dancers on stage to an audience of kids running around screaming. Idyllic? Hardly! {Birmingham Beach 2009}
I stumbled upon the International Food Fair in Victoria Square and New Street today, offering a wide variety of food from across the world. One of the more popular stalls wasn't from some far flung corner of the globe, it was from Shropshire! Alternative Meats offer kangaroo, ostrich and crocodile, amongst others. Also available was paella, a huge variety of sweets, cheeses, fruit and veg, pretty much anything you could want. The Food Fair ends tomorrow but will be open from 10am until 9pm if you fancy a wander round. {Large seating area at the Birmingham International Food Fair} {Peaches ...
Police in Bath and North East Somerset are leading the fight against domestic violence with the highest arrest rate in the Avon and Somerset force area. I read this story ealier follow this link to read the full story HERE
Guido has drawn my attention away from watching The Big Bang Theory on DVD and over to the news. Apparently Jim Devine the MP for Livingston is going to be one of the MPs that will be investigated to the police. There has been concern about shelving, Devine himself thinks that someone is committing fraud over the rewiring of his London flat. Good to know that the Met are going to be looking into it if that is the case. I'm sure Jim would want us all to get to bottom of 'any' fraud involved. More to follow when it ...
How wonderful to have my local neighbour (albeit in a rather more salubrious road than mine) Lord Carey regularly stating his views in the News of the World. We must all be most grateful.
A ICT teacher one said that he was going to have a "LAN party" over the weekend and upon hearing this I was a little amused by the name "LAN party" but was query to know what one was but after finding out and now googling "LAN party" here is some information that might be of amusement to you. IT Geeks and gamers get together network their computers up and they play multi player games head to head against each other its as easy as that! Who would have expected that such would actually happened and it wasn't a myth ...
Last week I wrote to all residents local to 89-91 Livery Street to inform them of a license application. The license would be for late night music, dancing and alcohol sales, so effectively it's an application for a nightclub. Opening hours could potentially be until 2am during the week, with Friday and Saturday extended to 4am. The premises are next to the recently opened Hatters Youth Hostel and very close to large residential blocks. In fact the top floor of the premises overlooks the courtyard of one block! Despite the presence of Subway City further down the road, this is ...
This is meant to be very funny. It's quite funny. It's Barack Obama's speech to the 2009 Radio and TV Correspondents' Association Dinner. There's a lot of US political in-jokes. But nobody can say this man hasn't got a sense of humour - even if the gags were written for him.
I'd quite like some. Transparency - particularly in politics at the moment - is what most of us are after. So why this mess-up on publishing MP's expenses? Take a look at the detailed reports and youl'll see they show the bare bones of information on expenses claims, with far too much non-confidential info blacked out [...]
It's the twentieth anniversary of my sister Fleur's death from cancer. Every time I smell philadelphus blossom the scent takes me back to that time. This week I took two young friends on a walk we used to go on together alongside the beck at Cowling. It was a beautiful evening and we all enjoyed it very much; the brook, the birdsong, the wild flowers.
The Tribune has published my letter following the Bradley Carty walk last week. And there are some photos up on Facebook.
At the one day conference at the London School Of Economics earlier this year, Nick Clegg was proposing that we make radical cuts in public spending. He informed us that we will have to make "tough choices". Soon afterwards Steve Richards told us that politicians often talk about tough choices, without themselves making the tough choice of telling us what they are. Since then those choices have been made. The first is that the party is no longer committed to a policy of and now the party is no longer committed to replacing Trident. In other words there is ...
40) Orson Scott Card, Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus (New York: Tor, 1996, ISBN 081250864). I picked up a second-hand copy of this after it was mentioned in a thread on MammothFail as a better example of an alternative history of the Americas, although of course still a white person's vision. I would probably have got more out of it if I had been more familiar with Columbus's real life story. Still, it was a good read that kept me turning the pages, and Card had clearly given some thought to the complexity of the economies, political systems etc ...
Twitter has been buzzing today with reports from people at the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, including Nickie. She posted this fabulous picture which shows off their very professional looking banner and t-shirts supporting the breakaway teams (FOTA) and politely calling for the removal of the FIA President and the commercial rights holder. They were standing near the pit lane exit. It's not difficult to sympathise with Nickie and many other fans when you read what the said Max and Bernie have been up to in the last day or so. Imagine there's a crisis in your world, you've seriously ...
Acronyms! A surprising result from the Lib Dem Voice poll on whether we should back Alternative Vote over First Past the Post (assuming it was to be on offer). Apparently 51% (out of 345 votes overall) think that we should. As I have blogged about before I want Single Transferable Vote. I was dubious about Alternative Vote Plus (AV+) as are a number of other Lib Dem bloggers (e.g. here and here) but at least that would be more closely proportional than FPTP. There's no such guarantee with AV. It may even end up being less proportional than FPTP. It ...
YES or NO Tough decision i think we have little choice apathy is winning the war, what choice do we have?
A Labour MP has criticised the voting system which allowed two BNP candidates to be elected as MEPs. Denis MacShane (Lab, Rotherham) condemned the success of the BNP and called for all-postal voting to be implemented. In the 2004 election in the Yorkshire region, he said, the BNP had received a smaller proportion of the [...]
Sat 20th
17:50
The Conservatives are to launch a formal complaint to the BBC Trust after it was revealed that Sir A...
.SOURCE EPOLITIX Sir Alan Sugar is to record another series of television show The Apprentice despite becoming the government's 'enterprise tsar'. The BBC felt that Sugar's advisory role did not mean that he would need to endorse or promote government policy. But shadow culture secretary Jeremy Hunt has lodged a complaint with the BBC Trust about [...]
Iain Dale has raised a question that has got me thinking and like many who read this blog will know when someone raises some questions and gets my thoughts going I always want to write a blog post or two about the issue. Iain writes about the over claiming of Council tax by about 50 MP's, personally I think this is a shamble and will destroy the image of politics in the UK. The normal person from the street who has found paying their Council tax difficult will be steaming when they hear the news about the MP's who have ...
I confess that I am more than marginally less excited at the outcome of the election of the next Speaker of the House of Commons than I am at the prospect of the Lions winning the next test or Andy Murray winning Wimbledon. Nevertheless it is all happening on Monday and there are plenty of people chipping in with their two-pennies worth. From what I can see the front runner is John Bercow, who despite being a possible closet socialist is actually a Conservative MP. He has the support of lots of Labour MPs but very few Conservatives. I also ...
The 9th and 10th sittings of the Equality Bill Committee We kicked off with a debate on amendments to do with 'reasonable adjustment' for people with disabilities. My proposals were around making it crystal clear that a 'reasonable adjustment' would not just be cosmetic. So - for instance - if a person in a wheelchair couldn't get into a bank because of steps what would a 'reasonable adjustment' be? Perhaps a bank might try to argue that it could just install a bell so that the person could ring and get someone to come outside to do business on the ...
So - the House of Commons Commission stuffs up, puts me on a list of MPs who have had to pay back monies. I get an email from the Telegraph almost immediately asking me to clarify the repayment! Having not had to pay back anything because I haven't done anything wrong (and the Telegraph should know as they crawled over my expenses early in the scandal and declared me a 'saint'), I was furious. What happened was that a reimbursement from a supplier got included for some reason in the list of MPs paying back expense claims. The House authorities ...
Sucker as I am for marketing gimmicks I broke the habit of a lifetime this morning and actually bought the Daily Telegraph just so that I could get a copy of their mega 68 page pull-out guide to every MPs allowance claims. My local newsagent even had a sign on the door telling people about the offer, though the anticipated rush to get the information had not materialised. Thus it was that I read the lead article about the over-claiming of Council Tax with mounting incredulity. It is not that I found it difficult to believe that MPs might act ...
The Conservative MP for Clwyd West and former Assembly Member (though he will not openly admit it) David Jones has commented on his blog on the call he received yesterday from the Daily Telegraph about his expense claims. It seems that sitting at a desk in London is not a good way to understand the very many demands on an MP's time: And the second allegation? Well, it ran as follows: Using your office expenses, you spent £9.79 on a Welsh dictionary. Please could you explain in what way you felt this was an appropriate use of public money, and ...
Social Justice and Local Government Minister, Brian Gibbons has become the fifth Assembly Member to announce that he will not be seeking re-election in 2011. The others are Environment Minister, Jane Davidson, Lorraine Barrett, Mick Bates and of course Rhodri Morgan. It could also be argued that Alun Davies decision to abandon Mid and West Wales to seek the Labour nomination in Blaenau Gwent amounts to the same thing but let's not get too presumptious. What this latest announcement does is to create some elbow room for whoever succeeds Rhodri Morgan as First Minister later this year. That election would ...
Oh great. William Hague brings back hunting as a key issue for the Tories. And apparently they need hunt supporters to help them get elected.
Don't forget, if you're a party member you can register for the Lib Dem Voice private members' forum. You'll be in good company: there are 975 registered members, all of whom have the opportunity to read and post on a rich variety of topics which don't always make it into the public blog, as well as having the chance to vote in LDV's monthly tracking surveys. Here's a selection of the currently active threads to whet your appetites: # Why we CAN win Norwich North # AV Plus # To 'engage with'.. or not to 'engage with'... the BNP # ...
She is unlikely to win but my preference for Speaker is Anne Widdecombe.
To be honest i was sat in bed last night with my cup of coffee and the thought came to me. What do people really imagine when they think of Conservatives? Upper-crust? Snobby? Rich? Fox hunters? Gentry Harry Enfield Tory Boy. Thatchers people Toffee nosed? I don't no what you think but i if you where to ask me, then i would say a party that [...]
We believe this is a ploy being used by New Labour to un settle our candidate. Besides we could not find one in his size. Updates will follow over the coming months so keep in touch.
Well at the meeting of fellow ward councillors i have made my position clear i will not work the the conservative group. And i warn my close friends within the party and fellow councillors look into any deals with great care because i feel very strongly we may be small in numbers but i do think [...]
What's is chances? every one seems to be throwing their hat in the ring. I am running out of candidates, well at least the punters will have a wide range of choice beside a Tax Dodger, if your reading the 13 Salford Labour members hard luck it's a pleasure to see there are still a [...]
This week has been very largely based on Night Jack and the death the Times brought to his blog. Here are the searches in order from 1-10. nick jacknightjackirfan ahmedkitty usshercampaign for kitty to resignnick jack blogrennardrecess monkeynightjack postsirfanahmed
Sat 20th
15:03Billions of pounds could be taken from council staff pension schemes to bail out the Government's PF...
, Partnership for Schools, the government body responsible for the £55 billion building programme, has approached several local authorities to ask for emergency cash from pension funds because private finance has dried up. The funds, worth £100 billion, cover final-salary pensions for two million council staff including social workers, cleaners, refuse collectors, lollipop ladies and [...]
HAZEL BLEARS RESELECTED SOURCE SALFORD STAR Star date: Friday June 19th 2009 HAZEL AVOIDS THE GRASS ROOTS `Hazel...Hazel...Hazel...Out! Out! Out!'... Last night 31 members of the Labour Party voted to re-select Hazel Blears and they've got a hell of a lot to answer for. Earlier in the day people had queued at the Hazel Must Go! stall on Salford [...]
I am a full time politician, but I remain a director of two companies that I founded and also other businesses that run through as John Hemming Trading My working week is around 70 hours a week. I spend about 4 hours a month chairing John Hemming & Co LLP. This means that over 98% of my time is spent on political issues. I do not think it is right to
I have been taking advice for fellow bloggers and my diary assistant and have realised that I should write the diary in first person and not third person as I was doing before when I was referring to myself as "Lord Greedy" it shall now be "I". So do keep reading my diary and I hope it continues to entertain you.
I have written an article which Lib Dem Voice have very kindly published entitled "Twitter and the rise of the new media". You can read it here.
The lovely Ms Gore's sponsorship runs out at midnight tonight. At midnight tonight I will be finishing work and dashing off to Richard and Sandra's solstice garden party, and then tomorrow morning is {[info - personal]} amazing_holly's birthday party. I have therefore taken the executive decision to unveil my new sponsor slightly early. In the spirit of transparency, Charlotte's sponsorship paid for McGruder to be mended, and the new one paid for my ticket to the FFW, without which I would not have been able to afford to go and annoy dear Tony. Next month is still unspoken for, my ...
Something fascinating happened yesterday. I was browsing through one of the internet forums I regularly visit when I noticed someone posting that people should go to the Daily Mail poll page on their website and vote yes to the poll that asks "Should gypsies jump the queue on the NHS?" in order to mess with them. When I got to the page and duly voted "Yes" I was astonished to see that the poll was at 93% Yes and 7% No. The forum I refer to has nowhere near enough people to make a dent in the thousands who vote ...
The man who wants to be the man in charge of the country's tax at after the next general election is accused by the lib Dems today of "flipping" his second home in order to save £55k in tax. The link to the story is HERE. If true, it means David Cameron will have to show whether his newly found conversion to open government and decency amongst Tory MPs is confined only to the old guard and those Tories he does not get on with or whether it extends to his inner circle.
On Monday I'll be booting up the desktop and sorting out the extensions on both computers. To that end, here is a list of what I have on McGruder at the moment. Expect a master list on Monday ;) ( list under the cut ) - isn't computer maintenance FUN? ;) * goes to sort out all her bookmarks * This blog is proudly sponsored by
David Smith spoke and answered questions at Neighbourhood Committee this week. He's the Chief Executive of NHS Kingston, the new name for the Primary Care Trust. David described the proposed developments at Surbiton Hospital, which will turn it into a polyclinic. A number of Surbiton GPs will be based there, but it will also offer a number of consultants' clinics. Down in...
I have just started listening to the Politalks podcasts from The Wardman Wire. I am always on the lookout for good political podcasts and the two I have listened to so far are of a good standard. They are interviews with a UKIP candidate and Tom Harris MP. The interviewer (from Charon QC, the UK law blog) is focused and gives the interviewee proper time to explore issues which is something I often find is lacking in the mainstream media. Try them out for yourself. The main link is here and the iTunes link is here. There are 3 so ...
Labour MP Bob Blizzard claimed on his Parliamentary expenses 39p for the cost of a single paperclip. Related posts:Nine months on, Daily Telegraph catches up on our Glenda Jackson story TodayJames Purnell accused of abusing expenses rules An ironic Dawn Butler's whirlpool bath When blogg
The Daily Mail is famous for its 'middle England' obsessions – from house prices and health to the Royal family – but also has a nasty undercurrent of racism and homophobia. There's even a widget to generate your own Daily Mail headline: my current favourite "ARE MUSLIMS GIVING YOUR PETS SWINE FLU?" Yesterday, their online poll [...]
It wasn't surprising to find that the UK's most expensive MP came from Scotland - I mean if you look at places as far flung as Orkney and Shetland, the Western Isles and the vast highland constituencies, travelling between London and there was going to be expensive enough - and then you have to add on the costs of getting round the place. But the highest expenses come not from Alistair Carmichael from Orkney and Shetland, but from Eric Joyce who represents Falkirk West, just up the road from me in the central belt. It's a fairly compact constituency, as ...
Following on from my previous post regarding the Noise Abatement Order given to the Rainbow in Digbeth. Last night I attended the official "Rainbow Response" to the Noise Abatement Order. I'd estimate about 300 people were crammed into the pub to hear the statement and with over 20,000 people now supporting the Facebook group, that just goes to show the extent of public feeling about this. Kent's response was excellent, summarising the current position and giving his thoughts. He confirmed the Rainbow will be appealing the Noise Abatement Order. You can view Pete Ashton's video of Kent's statement here. WARNING: ...
Fresh Squeezings from the veins of the internet:One of my current favourite blogs is Crust of the Grouch ( crust_of_the_grouch_feed). Grouch is a non-aligned political commenter. The text of her comments tends towards the pithy, so she won't overwhelm your f-list with essays like some. But the best bit is that she's an artist, and therefore each post has a satirical illustration of some kind. The one that jumped out to me today is here. Count Packula, Prince of Markness documents what happens when the twitterverse applies itself to a Daily Fail poll. Basically, hilarity ensues. The European Court of ...
While reading The Daily Mail the other day I was disturbed to read that Britain's Information Commissioner (Richard Thomas) has said he has serious concerns about a system being launched in October for the Independent Safeguarding Authority (ISA). The database will record criminal convictions of the 11 million adults who work with children, but also any so-called "soft intelligence" on individuals - which could include unfounded allegations, rumours or gossip passed to the police or social services. The ISA computer will contain detailed files on all the adults who work with children, whether professionally or as volunteers. That includes me, ...
Our next meeting is this coming Tuesday evening (23rd) at 7pm. People who've already been in touch have had letters or e mails, but if you are interested and we havent spoken yet, please do e mail me at paula.keaveney@liverpool.gov.uk
The debacle over the long drawn out release of MPs expenses under the Freedom of Information Act and the subsequent outrage at the Telegraph publication of the unredacted information before the overly redact official release would surely go down as a lesson learnt. However, the news that some MPs are seeking to stop any further publication is clearly an indication that if they have been listening they have picked up the wrong lessons from that. The public outrage is about what they spent and then the officious redacting of the public record. To try and hide that further on excel ...
As I blogged about yesterday about an MP who has been costing us £90+ for a mobile phone contract that he could have got cheaper it got me thinking about something that I shall share with you here. Many will have seen the advertisement to CompareTheMarket.com in which the cartoon talks about CompareTheMarkeet.com is that where our MP's have been comparing the market? I think our MP's think that CompareTheMarkeet.com is meant to be the price comparison website and have been spending all their time on the site which is actually costing the tax payer more then it should do. ...
Many bloggers are blogging about who they think should be the next Speaker but I am afraid that I can not do that because my candidate of choice is not in the running. At one point the issue was raised that Ming Campbell would be a candidate and this got me excited as I thought that it would be great to see Ming run for Speaker but it looks like Ming has pulled out. So I won't be supporting any other candidate in the job for Speaker and all I can say is let the best man/women win...
In the USA they are ahead of us in every thing except for maybe cricket but one thing is for sure they are ahead of us in blogging. A USA Scholarship has been set up to give Student bloggers a bit of money for blogging and personally I like the idea. To view the USA Scholarship site follow the link. Many students blog e.g. myself and many many others taking this into account a bloggers scholarship needs to be created in the UK in which bloggers who are students are given cash injections for blogging. We add to the world ...
Cast your minds back 10 days, and there was a flurry of excitement at the prospect of Gordon Brown deciding to do something radical, and reform the voting system. It wasn't long before the Prime Minister was back-tracking to make clear that he was simply in favour of reviewing the situation. But still the prospect of voting reform prompted LDV to ask the forced question: "Should Lib Dems back the Alternative Vote in a referendum if it's the only option for voting reform?" Here's what you told us: 51% (175 votes): Yes, it's better than first-past-the-post 35% (122): No, we ...
The Party is satisfied by it's auditors that we are within our legal rights not to repay any money donated to us by convicted fraudster Michael Brown. However, this is not an issue that only has legal dimensions; it must be considered from a political angle and within the context of our wider commitment to [...]
Dr Brian Gibbons has decided not to seek re-election to the Welsh Assembly in 2011. The BBC story is here.
Anti-knife campaigner Danny O'Brien will have his street stall on the Cally again today. Danny has found some eye-catching ways to raise awareness. Last month he organised a 24 hour walk between the Spurs and Arsenal grounds (Danny is a Spurs fan – nobody's perfect!). He's helped organise protest marches and walks under the theme [...]
The Labour Party was committed to decentralised government across the UK and that was why one of its first major changes was to enable the Scottish Parliament to be set up - it wanted to put power back to the people because it was right to do so. Aye, right! I can't stay up late enough to watch "This Week" on Thursdays so I watched it courtesy of the infernal wickedness of Sky Plus last night. They had this segment on Scottish politics with the Proclaimers. This is no great surprise if you think about it, but I was amused ...
Bradford's Woodland manager is looking into the damage to the entrance to Park Wood where a post has been removed and a quad bike appears to have been driven into the wood. They've also had a big clean up of rubbish lately, possibly as a result of my ...
That's what you want to watch this fine morning isn't it? Watch away! Woof woof. Woooooooooof. Related posts:I've recorded a music video! With lots of verses! And a guitar! Before youWoof woof bark spoon crime woof Woof woof A street sign for our times: beware of everything! Woof woof,
The Daily Telegraph has a handy summary of expense claims by Liberal Democrat MPs and peers.
Earlier this week Paul Walter drew our attention to the British Pathe website and some of its Liberal footage. Passing his discovery on, I mentioned a video of Sir Archibald Sinclair. I have been exploring the Pathe website and, naturally, searched for films on Market Harborough. I found film of the 1958 floods in the town. I found film of Jack Gardner from 1950. Gardner was the British and Empire heavyweight boxing champion and, until the advent of Martin Johnson, the town's most celebrated sporting son. I found priceless coverage of the first Inland Waterways Association rally, held at Market ...
We don't do an LDV Daily View 2 x 2 round-up on Saturdays, so instead here's an open thread. What stories have caught your eye? What issues are on your mind? Have you been scrutinising Lib Dem MPs' expenses? Who do you think should be the next Commons Speaker? Have you read the Government's Digital Britain report yet? Do you have suggestions for the next LDV party members' survey? Discuss away in the comments below...
It would have been wonderful if the party hadn't received a £2.4 million donation from Michael Brown in 2005. Few in the party can be happy that the 2005 General Election campaign was largely funded by money from someone later convicted of fraud - I'm certainly not. Ever since, though, the party has come under pressure for something a little different - to find £2.4 million and pay it to the victims of Michael Brown's fraud. American lawyer Robert Mann certainly wants that to happen. He was duped by Michael Brown and clearly hopes the Liberal Democrats can be persuaded, ...
{michael-brown} Newsnight's Michael Crick reports that the LibDems may face criminal action under the Proceeds of Crime Act for the £2.4m donation received from convicted fraudster Michael Brown in the run-up to the last General Election. Brown is now a fugitive from justice and American lawyer Robert Mann - one of those defrauded - believes the Liberal Democrats should have done more to ensure that the money was legit at the outset. He claims a "modicum of checking" would have revealed that the monies paid to the party were his, not Brown's. However this pans out, I think there are ...
