This image of a railway built on stilts in the middle of the Thames is taken from 'Unbuilt London' which is publishing a series of articles looking at the various schemes dreamt up but never implemented. Their first article looks at the transport schemes that never happened including this mad railway scheme and an airport over the Thames at the Houses of Parliament among many bizarre others...
The designated days that the Alliance Party amendment ensured that the Union Flag will still fly over Belfast City Hall are key days to our Monarch. It is rather ironic that a number of people have said that they didn't notice there was a Union Flag flying over City Hall on Twitter today. I used to work in a Government Office and the Union Flag was only flown on designated days. It always stood out as a special day when I could see the flag on the pole outside my window, it made me wonder what (and more often who) ...
Another gem from the British Council Film Collection.
This Andrew Grice report has just gone up on the Independent website and will presumably appear in tomorrow's paper: A new cross-party group will be set up by senior Labour figures tomorrow in an attempt to heal the party's rift with the Liberal Democrats and open the door to Lib-Lab co-operation in another hung parliament. Labour for Democracy will try to build bridges with other progressive parties, including the Greens. But it will reach out to Nick Clegg's party, with whom relations were stretched to breaking point when he took the Lib Dems into coalition with the Conservatives in 2010. ...
The home secretary Theresa May was quoted in the Sun this morning attacking those, chiefly the Lib Dems it seemed, who her Communications Data Bill. Isabel Hardman takes up the story on the Spectator Coffee House blog: This irritated David Davis sufficiently for the Tory backbencher to raise May's comments as a point of order in the House of Commons this afternoon. Davis, who has made his own opposition to the Bill abundantly clear from the start, told the Speaker:"I raise this point of order with you in respect of your duty of defending the interests and rights of backbenchers ...
Today's news that Rod Stewart and Steve Winwood are to play 10 dates together in the US next year puts me in mind of this American television special from 1965 when Stewart was 20 and Winwood 17. Winwood is expertly eased away from the microphones by Eric Burdon early on, while Stewart does not appear until about 2:50. Julie Driscoll is also on stage, but the real star of the show is Long John Baldry.
On with Odanglesex's state-of-the-art stationery ordering, another reposted and tweaked Odanglesex adventure, the second in the series on moving stationery into the 21st century through innovative direction management. FROM:Dale Brashcon, Transformational Excellence Champion TO: Douglas Black, Performance Networking Consultant cc: Albert Doxe, Transit Facility Manager No, Douglas, I didn't order 200 barrels of cleaning fluid through Supersmart. I ordered 200 black biros. FROM: Douglas Black TO: Dale Brashcon Dale: The Supersmart code is definitely for barrels of cleaning fluid and the supplier will enforce payment. Albert is asking where we should put them as he understands he is about to ...
George Osborne is allegedly going to cut welfare for pensioners and the unemployed with a below inflation rise. This is the worst possible and most cruel thing to do to those in need around Christmas time. This means that the poorest will have to suffer at "the time of giving". Instead of the chancellor putting more of a strain on the rich he may decide to cut from the most vulnerable members of society instead. The poor may not be able to even afford the bare essentials because of rising prices and less money in their pockets. Time for the ...
There are tightly contested and highly significant elections taking place in Ghana, a nation not complacent in its democracy, but still with among Africa's best records for unbroken free elections. I've enjoyed following Afua Hirsch's dispatches from west Africa, it's greatly to the Guardian's credit that it has someone on the ground to give the ...
Back in March, people living near the Booker Avenue/Greenhill Road junction were given some infomation about plans for 16 flats to be built on the empty bit of land opposite the pub (not the former garage, the other bit) The Council owns the land and the idea was that they would let South Liverpool Housing have it for a development, with planning permission coming in over the summer. Well clearly that didn't happen, but there is some movement now. South Liverpool Housing tell us that they plan to put a planning application in this month (December). Once this is in, ...
Eric Pickles is apparently going on Desert Island Discs this week. We know this because he tweeted such, and asked for song suggestions. Leaving aside the fact that one is supposed to choose songs which have some special personal meaning, not crowdsoure it, many people have been making suggestions to him, some less polite than others. I can think of none more appropriate than this one, from my beloved father. I've bolded the most appropriat passage, in my view:I am the man, the very fat man, That waters the workers' beer I am the man, the very fat man, That ...
Back in October, said BBC News: Sons and daughters of any future UK monarch will have equal right to the throne, after Commonwealth leaders agreed to change succession laws. The leaders of the 16 Commonwealth countries where the Queen is head of state unanimously approved the changes at a summit in Perth, Australia. It means a first-born daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge would take precedence over younger brothers.Which is just as well in view of today's news. It will also avoid a situation I warned of earlier this year: My second piece of advice is to urge ...
This is a slightly extended version of an article I wrote for Better Nation, naturally focusing on the Scottish party. It is shared here in the hope that many of my fellow Liberal Democrats will engage in the debate. This question has inevitably been asked following the party's poor performance in last week's by-elections - most notably in Rotherham where the Liberal Democrats finished in eighth place with two per cent of the vote. What results from Middlesbrough, Croydon North and Rotherham actually tell us about the Liberal Democrats is minimal. These are constituencies where Liberal Democrats never did well, ...
It's funny, but before two weeks ago, I can't remember the last time I heard the phrases "slippery slope" or "crossing the Rubicon". In the run up to, and immediately after, the publication of the Leveson report we have heard of little else. – That and "underpinning", another phrase not otherwise in general use. Hopefully, the weekend has allowed people to actually read some of Leveson's report and we may now hear less of slopes slippery and rivers Rubicon. In the report, Sir Brian Leveson is at pains to point out, numerous times, that he wants "voluntary independent self-regulation". On ...
A planning application has been submitted for a wind turbine behind the White House on the B4465 near Wayleaze, Codrington Road, Wapley. You can find out more and make comments online.
Congratulations to Network Rail on completing repairs to the landslip at Westerleigh Junction ahead of time. Their staff worked day and night to complete the work so that rail sevices can resume. You can read the BBC report here.
Nibley Lane is expected to close for cleaning between Badminton Road and Westerleigh Road from 9.30am until 2.30pm on Thursday 6th December.
The Liberal Democrats have just selected their candidates for elections to the European Parliament in June 2014. These elections are important to the party – it takes itself seriously as a player in this forum, and it contributes a lot to the party's strength and depth nationally. But the party faces a wipe-out. It needs some radical thinking to have a chance of avoiding such a fate. The problems start with the party's low opinion poll standing. The typical 9-10% is not enough to get the party representation in any of the regional constituencies, except the South East, under the ...
For a few weeks now I have been working part-time at a local supermarket, picking the orders paced online. It is company policy to assist shoppers whenever they seek assistance. When a customer asks the location of a product, it is expected that staff will take the customer to the correct location rather than simply point in the general direction.Such a customer approached me on Friday in the breakfast cereals isle.I was expecting her to ask for the whereabouts of the Weetabix or the Cornflakes.Instead she asked me what were her husbands favourite cereals?My only honest response had to be ...
Danny Alexander has announced £154 million of extra funding for HMRC to "get under the skin" of multinationals who are not paying their fair share of tax. Some media sites are reporting that he may boycott Starbucks. There is one slight snag with that claim. Danny revealed on Today this morning that he is a tea drinker. * Newshound: bringing you the best Lib Dem commentary published in print or online.
Just had an email through with details of the Council's Trees For Years scheme for next year. As has happened in previous years, the Council will be giving out 2,013 trees, shrubs and bushes to Colchester residents to help make the Borough a greener place. Next year's event will be taking place on Saturday 2nd February, between 10am and 1pm at Rowan House – the Council's main offices on Sheepen Road, just off the Middleborough roundabout. These are the species that will be available: Raspberry canes Blackcurrant canes Gooseberry bush Blackberry root Acer campestre - Field Maple Prunus padus - ...
The McCanns, the Dowlers, and the Gurkhas threatened with deportation are ordinary people thrown into exceptional situations, their lives tossed from one side to the other not just by fate but, like 'cargo', to be exploited for cash and credit by the powerful and the acquisitive. Liberal Democrats in general and Nick Clegg in particular have always been at their best when standing shoulder to shoulder with ordinary people against a conniving, power-hoarding Establishment, be that Fleet Street, corrupt local officials, or self serving bureaucracies. That was the message that connected him to a huge audience watching the first PM ...
Mon 3rd
17:09
William and Kate announce they are having a baby, Guardian decides we need a liveblog....
Sign up to the Despatch Box, the new weekly political e-magzine from digitalpolitico.net The world has finally be given the delightful news that the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are to have a child. It's all very exciting, as the ... Continue reading →
Residents have been concerned that the gate to the Gatley Rec playground (at the Co-op end) wasn't closing automatically. The problem for the Parks people turned out to be that the spring had broken on the gate. Replacing it with one spring wouldn't have done the job, but two springs would make it too strong, potentially injuring a child. The solution was to buy a new gate, and Keith has been pressing for that. We've now had confirmation from the Council that the new gate has been ordered and should be installed shortly after Christmas – good news for child ...
Diana Wynne Jones might be touching on an interesting idea – that if you spend your time doing a lot of 'evil' things, even if you don't know exactly what you're doing – it spills over into the rest of your life and you develop a toxic attitude that ruins your happiness elsewhere. I suspect, however, it's more a case of "if you are determined to be miserable, you will be", independent of whether or not you're involved in criminal activity in your spare time, which is an easier idea to fit into a children's story. The Lives of Christopher ...
Mon 3rd
16:00
Hussein-Ece and Brinton on stalking, under-representation of women and gender based violence
November 25th saw the UN's International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. This occasion was marked by a debate in the House of Lords last Thursday. Just reading the Hansard account of the debate made me feel sick. There was a former surgeon describe the hours of surgery it took to reconstruct one woman's face after a violent attack by her partner. There were descriptions of how girls as young as 12 were subjected to Female Genital Mutilation in this country despite laws against it. Where is the worst place in the world to be a woman? Reputedly ...
Leveson has made a devastating case for changing the status quo of press regulation. A system which abuses many innocent people in an "outrageous" way must be reformed. History shows us that this is a repetitive problem. In their pursuit of sensational stories, in order to sell more copies, editors and journalists eventually go too far, their behaviour sinks so low that there is a scandal, and action is taken to restore the rule of law and acceptable standards. The system works but at a terrible price including many individuals whose lives are ruined. The challenge issued by Leveson is ...
Mon 3rd
15:48
Damn Red Dragon: suckmyphalalalalalalalala: sqiurtle: dorkstrider: i don't believe my...
Damn Red Dragon: suckmyphalalalalalalalala: sqiurtle: dorkstrider: i don't believe my...: suckmyphalalalalalalalala: sqiurtle: dorkstrider: i don't believe my blog caught this particular virus but if you see this post do not click the video for fuck's sake just don't click it it will endlessly reblog this post and just majorly dick up your blog so don't...
A developer is looking at the possibility of building 100 or so houses on land to the West of Upper Chapel in Launceston. They are holding an exhibition in the Town Hall tomorrow and the public is invited to come along to have their say. The consultation runs from 1pm until 7.30pm. Development on this and neighbouring sites were considered by the framework steering group recently and discounted. The Framework is a planning outline for our town which will ultimately form part of Cornwall's core strategy. The process saw every green field site surrounding the town evaluated to see whether ...
Full marks to Cllr Andrew Wallis who has spotted that Cornwall Council's staff survey on the potential privatisation of key services contains just two real options. Staff are asked to rank four choices in order of preference. One is an in-house option. Two more are essentially the same thing (the BT bid and 'out-sourcing') and the final one is 'Undecided'. So what happened to the fourteen different options that councillors were told were being considered when wee had a briefing last week? The full council had demanded that a wide range of possibilities - which should all have been in ...
One bit of very good news on welfare front - the Liberal Democrats have held firm and told George Osborne where to shove his ridiculous plan to take Housing Benefit away from under 25s, according to yesterday's Observer. Nor is he getting to freeze benefits as he would have liked. The piece has a great quote from Greg Mulholland, Liberal Democrat MP for Leeds North West who says: The Lib Dems would not stand for cutting housing benefits for under 25-year-olds which would not only be unjust and unfair but would have unacceptable consequences for many young people. Neither do ...
The County Council's Planning Application for the Belle Vue site has gone online and can be read in full by clicking here. You should note that this planning application does not mean that the Village Green application has been finally settled. It hasn't. To the best of my knowledge the county council and Green Spaces submissions are still with the inspector for consideration and advice on his recommended outcome. The planning application will repay careful study, and local people with issues such as the siting of the skate park, traffic assessment, bats, coal mining, drainage are well advised to consider ...
Mon 3rd
14:28
Hussein-Ece and Brinton on stalking, under-representation of women and gender-based violence
November 25th saw the UN's International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. This occasion was marked by a debate in the House of Lords last Thursday. Just reading the Hansard account of the debate made me feel sick. There was a former surgeon describe the hours of surgery it took to reconstruct one woman's face after a violent attack by her partner. There were descriptions of how girls as young as 12 were subjected to Female Genital Mutilation in this country despite laws against it. Where is the worst place in the world to be a woman? Reputedly ...
The hole which suddenly opened up in Royal Road a few days ago turns out to have been a swallow hole! This described as follows by county officials: 'We get a number if these throughout the County each year, usually the cause is a very localised natural dissolving of a deeper layer of ground below the road construction layers. Therefore the rest of the road should be fine.' Which is very nearly – but not quite – reassuring!
After a rather dispiriting couple of days, there is finally some evidence of senior Lib Dems are remembering how to be liberal. Home Office Minister Jeremy Browne is apparently standing fast within government against the illiberal idea of minimum alcohol ... Continue reading →
It is one of the biggest arguments on football message boards up and down the land. When a club is successful the hard core get annoyed at all the bandwagon jumpers. 'Were you there when we were playing x in the pouring rain on a wet and miserable Tuesday night?' they'll ask. It has always caused tension as the hard core feel that they belong more and deserve a bigger say. If a manager is under pressure and they think he should go whereas the newcomers are still not sure then the hard core will feel that their voice is ...
On Friday I went to hear Jim Wallace speak. He spoke of many things including how he believes Scottish devolution should be developed. As part of this I thought he was particularly eloquent in his passage about why Scotland should remain part of the UK. He not only made the case well but he touched the emotions of his audience - a mixed one of proud Scots and people from other parts of the British Isles. There are many different ways into this argument; cultural, political and economic - but on the night Jim Wallace quoted this passage from the ...
Aerospace manufacturing is a huge contributor to the economic make up of Burnley, a town steeped in manufacturing tradition. International aerospace manufacturers Aircelle are at the forefront of high tech manufacturing for the aerospace industry and are a great provider of jobs and wealth to the local and national economy. Burnley has benefited well from all three rounds of the Regional Growth Fund (RGF). The government has awarded £1.8m to the redevelopment of the old Michelin site into a brand new state of the art Aerospace Supply Chain Park. The bid was put forward by a consortium headed up by ...
There will be a debate on Leveson in the House of Commons this afternoon. Here is the text of a press release I put out earlier today in support of the full implementation of Leveson. John Leech MP ... Continue reading →
My fingers are so cold that I mis-typed that title three times. Seriously my heating needs to work faster... Anyway yes. Another day and another Lib Dem member and this time Town and Parish councillor has left the party stating that the reason is the leader of the party. Speaking to what is without a doubt one of the most successful local rags in the country – the Isle of Wight County Press Cllr Bob Blezzard said that he has sent a letter to Nick Clegg with the following: "Failure to honour the pledge on tuition fees, when you did ...
Tomorrow the UKs Open Data Institute will formally open, a year after Chancellor George Osborne announced it in the previous Autumn Statement. In addition to the formal Ministerial launch, the ODI will host an open house session where members of ... Continue reading →
Meols Ward Lib Dem Councillors John Dodd, David Rimmer and Nigel Ashton are holding their next monthly advice centre on Saturday 8th December, from 11 am to 12 noon at St John's Primary School, Rufford Road, Crossens. We will be there to meet you and discuss any Council problems you may have. No appointment necessary. Just pop in. We hold our advice centre every month (except August) on the second Saturday of the month at St John's School, Crossens.
I still need to do a comics catch-up post but for a quick hit, of all the various advent things going around, my favourite is the Phoenix's Santa-Thon. This is not JUST because Miss Holly's suggestion got chosen to be drawn by Art Monkey (after all, she has form for suggesting curious Santas for Santathons) but because this year, as in previous years, it is shaping up that there will be some wonderfully weird and hilarious suggestions. I genuinely recommend the Phoenix as a great, broad-ranging comic for kids. It has the funny, but also the emotional, the educational, and ...
I was in Oxford this weekend, to catch up with Dan, [IMG: [twitter.com profile] ] misterjta and [IMG: [livejournal.com profile] ] fleeblewidget, who I've not seen in far too long (getting on for 18 months), play some board games and eat late night ice cream. (Hooray G&D's!) I was introduced to several new games - 7 Wonders, Dominion, Playtest and expansions, Cash'n'Guns and then, as people on Twitter may have noticed, Articulate! - the latter of which was probably far more fun than is truly legal. Some of the descriptions and answers that came up were truly brilliant. (If I ...
There are few occupations that are as open, where the barrier to entry is as low as it is in web design and development. If you have the ability, and are willing to learn, you can get started without a formal education or having to pay for college courses. Most of what you need to know can be found free of charge online. Rachel Andrew on The Pastry Box Project I remember being at OpenTech in 2010 and listening to one of the speakers talk about her work with young people. One of the teenagers she worked with had ambitions ...
Over the last few years, Liberal Youth has been lobbying and consulting on issues that matter to our members with Liberal Democrat MPs, peers, MEPs, federal party committees, working groups and HQ staff. Examples of this process are our campaigns to try to stop the proposed cut to Housing benefits for the under-25s and to make sure that more internships are being created in this government than in any other, so that opportunities can be widened for young people. Liberal Youth is also sticking up for human rights all around the world, such as our Bears for Belarus campaign. As ...
According to local police "...there have been a few thefts of the small Hungry Harry bins across the Sector." In response police are recommending that these bins are placed out ON THE MORNING of bin collection rather than the night before as we believe the thefts are taking place overnight. Commenting, local ward councillor Darren Fower said: "While cycling home from work over the last week or so, I've already seen remnants of these grey bins, that have been discarded or destroyed. Anyone who's bin is destroyed should contact the local police and notify them, as well as the City ...
This week lots of statistics were made public in responses to councillor questions at Council Assembly: East Dulwich Potholes 2011/12 – emergency potholes 16, 24hour response potholes 66. For the whole of Southwark last financial year 2,697 and so far half way into this financial year 1,548 before the winter period when potholes are exacerbated from freeze/thaw action. So it looks like ur roads are declining quite rapidly. East Dulwich council home sales - 1 right to buy since April 2010 and 12 non right t buy – when Southwark decides to sell a house. Zero council homes were built. ...
Today is International Day of Persons with Disabilities - all over the world except in the UK. In the UK Iain Duncan Smith is marking the day by continuing and intensifying his campaign against unemployed people in general and disabled people in particular. Every disabled claimant now has to undergo a Work Capability Assessment (started by Labour - who have yet to apologise for it). The WCA is in fact a BDS - a Benefit Denial System. Its purpose is to get people off benefits by any means possible. The claimant's own description of their condition is not credited, medical ...
So this year having seen the number of performing Christmas (and other seasons) light displays I'm bringing you all a different one each day. So if you put down the games on your mobile phones long enough to look up here is today's offereing
It's funny, but before two weeks ago, I can't remember the last time I heard the phrases "slippery slope" or "crossing the Rubicon". In the run up to, and immediately after, the publication of the Leveson report we have heard of little else. – That and "underpinning", another phrase not otherwise in general use. Hopefully, the weekend has allowed people to actually read some of Leveson's report and we may now hear less of slopes slippery and rivers Rubicon. In the report, Sir Brian Leveson is at pains to point out, numerous times, that he wants "voluntary independent self-regulation". On ...
Actually, it's more like the basic statistics behind those Obama emails. But science is sexy and statistics (despite Tim Harford and Nate Silver's best efforts) is not, yet. So the headline uses "science" for this interesting piece on the Obama campaign emails: [IMG: A Barack Obama email. Photo credit: DavidErickson on Flickr] Fortunately for Obama and all political campaigns that will follow, the tests did yield one major counterintuitive insight: Most people have a nearly limitless capacity for e-mail and won't unsubscribe no matter how many they're sent. "At the end, we had 18 or 20 writers going at this ...
Cicero's Songs: Making the same mistake twice "I believe that the British Press is a major contributor to the current national crisis in Britain. The idea that these corporate entities, a large number of which are foreign owned, are the only thing keeping the British political world free of corruption is laughable. I do believe the public has a right to know. I do not think that protests by the Press we are seeing now are about the principle of right to know, I think they are about the far more limited principle of profit. I do not think that ...
From the start of "jungle" I've been in the "Good Luck to Her" camp.So I found this very amusing this morning.
A campaign to name and shame multi-national companies who do not pay their fair share in tax looks like it is gaining a head of steam after the House of Commons' Public Accounts Committee (PAC) jumped into the fray. The Independent reports on the Committee's conclusions that these "immoral" multinational companies should face prosecution rather than being offered sweetheart deals by the UK Government: The Chancellor, George Osborne, will announce an extra £150m of funding for Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC) this week to help crack down on avoidance by global companies with British operations, which the Treasury predicts ...
Episode 39 of the House of Comments podcast "Crossing the Rubicon" was recorded yesterday evening and is out today. This week myself and Emma Burnell were joined by libertarian blogger Mark Wallace to discuss the Leveson report and political reaction to it, the recent by-elections especially with respect to the UKIP surge and what we would like to see in the Chancellor's pre-budget statement this week. You can subscribe to the podcast on iTunes here (note - this is a new feed so if you used to subscribe to the old feed a couple of years ago you'll need to ...
I have long campaigned for improved recycling facilities across the West End and, in particular, for the tenemental properties that have no household recycling facilities at present. The council provides neighbourhood facilities (paper and glass only) but really does need to increase household facilities if it is going to achieve the step change in recycling that will be necessary to achieve Scottish Government targets into the future. For this reason I have welcomed research that Zero Waste Scotland is undertaking research, mainly in the West End Ward - and partly in neighbouring Coldside - to further promote recycling and waste ...
Was David Cameron's reaction the Leveson report any great surprise? One of the starting points of the inquiry was the concern that politicians - including Cameron himself - had got "too close" to the press. Forecasting that he would side with the press interest rather than the public interest took no great insight. And it looks like we're heading that way. One might argue that this is simply one further illustration of the problem in question. The response from parts of the press was similarly predictable, on at least two levels. First, it was predictable that the papers, particularly those ...
