FlockTogether now automatically tweets details of the latest phone banks entered in the system twice a day. Let me know if you have any comments or suggested changes to the way it does it.
From tomorrow's Observer: David Cameron's vision of a compassionate Conservatism has been lost in a lurch to the right, according to the prime minister's former adviser who coined the "hug a hoodie" line.Danny Kruger, Cameron's former speechwriter, said the prime minister had allowed his ambitions to be hijacked by a rhetoric centred on "bashing burglars and sending immigrants home", instead of an optimistic agenda that would benefit communities. Kruger said Cameron had lost his pre-election drive and energy and that his reforming programme, including the "big society" ethos, had fallen victim to cowardice in the face of criticism from the ...
For no other reason than... because it is awesome!
Just a quick reminder; the plan for the future of the roads around Bar Hill and Cambridge is currently being defined. It's vitally important that as many people as possible in/ around our villages fill in this survey to ensure that our voice is heard. Please complete this short survey; http://bit.ly/17AHvVv The survey is being run by Cambridgeshire County Council.
Dark Was The Night - Cold Was The Ground is a piece by blues musician Blind Willie Johnson. Little about him is known for certain; he may have been blinded by his stepmother after his father beat her for sleeping with another man. This song was picked for the Voyager golden discs by Carl Sagan, because "Johnson's song concerns a situation he faced many times: nightfall with no place to sleep. Since humans appeared on Earth, the shroud of night has yet to fall without touching a man or woman in the same plight." Johnson died in 1945, sleeping on ...
London Mayor Boris Johnson has decided to drastically cut London Fire and Rescue Services by 550 front firefighters and 10 firestations. This will enable him to reduce Chris part of council tax by around 7p per week per household. I expect most would prefer the reassurance of keeping those 550 firefighters and fire stations. For East Dulwich it means espouse times going up from 6 min 30 seconds to 6 mins 37 seconds. We're lucky that these cuts are unlikely to have a drastic impact. But the changes will reduce the depth of resources available which has to be of ...
Two years ago, almost to the day, a rather fetching grey and white job with a distinctive tip to its tail won Bishop's Castle Cat of the Day. That cat was in the old market square again today, so I went to photograph it again - only to find the battery was not in my camera. As I hurried back to my B&B to collect it, I reasoned that the cat must have decided to help me by posing because it remembered winning the award. Think Androcles and the lion. However, that was not enough to win it my Cat ...
Lib Dem Voice has polled our members-only forum to discover what Lib Dem members think of various political issues, the Coalition, and the performance of key party figures. More than 600 party members have responded, and we're publishing the full results. Party members oppose all-women shortlists by 66% to 26% Events this year have once again shone an unflattering light on the party's lack of female representation in the House of Commons. Though, as Mark Tompson has previously highlighted here on LDV, this is in part at any rate down to first-past-the-post skewing Lib Dem election results. All-women shortlists is ...
Since I moved in my neighbour's beautiful Burmese Grey has always greeted me warmly in the street but run away when encountered in my garden (jungle). Today she recognised me in the garden and followed me into my study. This post has been somewhat delayed by her jumping on to my desk and attempting to help me write it. She has also provided me with another excuse (other my own indolence
Here's today's hand-picked selection that caught my interest... Monetary policy: An unfinished revolution | The Economist Fascinating from @ryanavent » Monetary policy: An unfinished revolution | The Economist http://econ.st/1601zmR [via @gilesyb] Red or Dead by David Peace - review | Books | The Guardian I prefer David Peace's novels in principle to practice. (Excellent review of Red or Dead by Mark Lawson) http://bit.ly/1eyr9P7 BBC News – How many acid attacks are there? Horrific, horrific stuff > BBC News – How many acid attacks are there? http://bbc.in/13LWVXr
(Crossposted from Goodreads) I really need to post more reviews of books I've read, don't I? I'm reading them far faster than I can review them. But I'm going to try to do more. To start with, here's the sequel to last year's Tales Of The City, and so I have to add my obligatory [...]
Last month the local press reported that the most recent meeting of the full council of Luton Borough Council was going to debate some guidance on how Councillors should use the social networking service Twitter. This is the paper that was presented to Councillors at that meeting on the 16 July 2013: The paper is an obvious fudge. From a careful reading I reckon that the true story is probably something like the following; It seems likely that some members of the Council had objected to other members of the Council's use of social networking, presumably during meetings, and wanted ...
Prompted by a message this morning on the OU Psychology Graduates Facebook group, I've been re-reading the prospectus for the Occupational Psychology MSc I've been accepted onto at Leicester University. I've got until the end of this month to stump up the first of six installments, each of around £1,450 (gulp), so it's definitely been worthwhile re-reading the course summary and brochure to remind myself what I'm letting myself in for over the next couple of years. The course consists of six core modules plus a dissertation. There are no examinations to take as everything is based on continuous assessment. ...
[IMG: Twitter iPhone] OMG! Some star ***LOVES*** Samsung. Back when Twitter started, they used to advertise which Twitter clients people used. You could see that Stephen Fry preferred Feathers, and that I used Dabr. All was well. Then, of course, Twitter went to war with its third party developers. They cut their API limits, reduced their functionality, and obliterated all mention of third party clients. Which means that you can't see that certain "celebs" are hypocrites. Looking at the underlying data of the above tweet shows that it was sent from "Twitter for iPhone". Look, I don't really care that ...
Lib Dem Voice has polled our members-only forum to discover what Lib Dem members think of various political issues, the Coalition, and the performance of key party figures. More than 600 party members have responded, and we're publishing the full results. Lib Dem members back HS2 by 55% to 31% There are plans to build a new high speed rail link (called HS2) between London and Birmingham, and then on to Manchester and Leeds. This is currently expected to cost around £42 billion. Do you support or oppose these plans? 55% – Support 31% – Oppose 13% – Don't know ...
Would the hapless Euro-MP Godfrey Bloom have offended with the same remark about bongo-bongo land a generation ago - in, say, 1967? I have a feeling he would have done. Even the year before Enoch Powell's 'Rivers of Blood' speech, and the dockers marching in his support, most of us in the UK would have found it tasteless and boorish, if not offensive. Though, it is a marginal call. Am I alone in remembering the lines of the original signature tune to the BBC's Start the Week, sung by Lance Percival, and the line the follows "come to Bradford in ...
posted The Blood is The Life 09-08-2013 http://t.co/YOTgFM18Nx on #dreamwidth (tags: (from twitter) dreamwidth ) http://pinterest.com/pin/164803667587065426/ Six for president fanart (@SawbonesHex) http://t.co/6mqnI9FL3q (tags: (from twitter) ) http://pinterest.com/pin/164803667587065394/ More Sir Lee. This one is from Dracula Prince of darkness, I think. http://t.co/HyLIyKuMdH (tags: (from twitter) ) http://pinterest.com/pin/164803667587065387/ Is Sir Lee stood in a trench or is Moore stood on a box? http://t.co/cbEMNxKp20 (tags: (from twitter) ) http://pinterest.com/pin/164803667587065381/ Don't cry, emo Dracula http://t.co/ZRbOcfoJWk (tags: (from twitter) ) http://pinterest.com/pin/164803667587065378/ Stunning fan art of Sir Lee and Melissa Stribling http://t.co/hbs4pua259 (tags: (from twitter) ) The Nightmare Before Christmas. Tim Burton's original poem, ...
Yes, it is that time once again when we celebrate Ros's birthday. Naturally, I have found an interesting and thoughtful gift to present to her, although that gets a little harder each year - we're at an age where we have most of the things that we want, and there isn't really much more room in the house. But, most of all, we have a pleasant day in the country planned, a nice dinner sitting in the refrigerator awaiting its turn in the oven, and the sun is beginning to break through. So, happy birthday, my love...
The picture from the latest ONS survey of internet usage in Britain is clear. Not only is internet usage high, it has grown so quickly that the public's use of the internet has shifted hugely even just within the last four or five year electoral cycle that most matters to you: [IMG: ONS data on internet usage] The most popular online activity? Email. How do you integrate online tactics such as email with more traditional offline tactics? 101 Ways To Win An Election is (surprise!) a good place to start – available both as a printed book and as an ...
Last night, Janet & I had the pleasure of attending a thoroughly enjoyable wine tasting evening at Aitken Wines at Annfield Row, a fundraising event for the Friends of Magdalen Green's Roseangle playpark campaign. Over £430 was raised - many thanks to Sharon and Alice for all their hard work in making the night so enjoyable and successful!
Yesterday afternoon, along with Dundee LibDem colleagues and colleagues from other parties and none, I took part in Better Together campaigning in the City Centre as part of Better Together's sixth national campaigning weekend. We had an excellent reception from the many people we spoke with. Here's me (pictured right) near the McManus Galleries and (below) with some of the other Dundee Better Together campaigners at the Boots Corner:I was interviewed by Wave 102 News yesterday about the Better Together campaigning weekend - you can hear the interview by clicking 'play' below:
[IMG: ldv coalition lessons] LibDemVoice is running a daily feature, 'Lessons of Coalition', to assess the major do's and don'ts learned from our experience of the first 3 years in government. Reader contributions are welcome, either as comments or posts. The word limit is no more than 450 words, and please focus on just one lesson you think the party needs to learn. Simply email your submission to voice@libdemvoice.org. Today Patrick Murray shares his thoughts. Make sure our policies are reflected in our manifesto One of the great challenges facing our society is the housing crisis. For many young people ...
There are two meetings scheduled for Blyth Town Council next week. Assets Committee Tuesday 13th August, 6:30 pm , at Arms Evertyne House Planning & Development Commitee, Thursday 15th August, 5:30 pm at Arms Evertyne House This meeting may be cancelled due to the council's policy ( well, the Labour Group's policy ) of only meeting every 6 weeks unless there is urgent business
As snippets of "good news" about improvements in the state of our economy begin to filter through commentators, particularly on the right, are already talking about the "green shoots of economic recovery." Given the ridicule which Norman Lamont's use of the phrase generated way back in the 1990s, this could turn out to be something of an own goal. Nevertheless, on the radio earlier this week I heard that the Daily Mail was proclaiming that "Wow!" is now the only way describe Britain's economic vitality. Keynes spoke of the effects of the "animal spirits" of entrepreneurs on the all-important levels ...
It has been revealed that over 10,000 patients have been waiting for more than 36 weeks until the start of their NHS treatment, an increase of around 1,195 compared to the previous month. The Welsh Government has a target that not a single person should wait longer than 36 weeks. Yet figures released today show that 10,123 waited longer than this, which is the highest figure in over a 25 month period. It is appalling that over ten thousand people have been forced to wait over 36 weeks until the start of their treatment. Waiting for the start of treatment ...
From the Go Dundee team: To celebrate Dundee's fully-deserved short listing for UK City of Culture 2017, Go Dundee has organised a special learning journey event. On Saturday 31st August the Dundee City of Culture learning journey (a walking tour) will contain an exciting range of cultural experiences including modern art, theatre, dance, print-making, artists' studios and more. This event is open to everyone. Numbers are limited so please book early. Date: Saturday 31st August 2013 at 09.30-17.00 Cost: £8 for lunch (the learning journey itself is free) To book: DCA box office on Dundee 909900 or in person Venues ...
By way of endorsement I have set out a press release from the Badger Trust in full below: The Prime Minister and his friends in the cattle industry are busy trying to brainwash the public about killing badgers. 'Pilot' culls are due to begin before the end of the year and there is an increasing barrage of propaganda to soften up public opinion with outrageous and unsubstantiated claims about bovine tuberculosis (bTB) and its impact. David Williams, Chairman of the Badger Trust, said: "Mr Cameron told BBC's Radio 4 that there could be '...appalling consequences for badgers' if the culls ...
