Apparently this actually happened on Newsnight:
[IMG: GCHQ Building at Cheltenham, Gloucestershire] Six people died on the roads today. None died as a result of terrorism. But Andrew Harper of MI5 says its really scary and we must give them the tools. Yes, but... Noone is saying that MI5 shouldn't have the tools to do their job. But there should be proper oversight such as these proposed by John Lanchester in the Guardian last weekend: Here are two specific proposals. The first is that the commissioners who supervise GCHQ include, alongside the senior judges who currently do the work, at least one or two public figures ...
A precious find on Youtube this evening. Melton Mowbray North was the town's station on the Great Northern and London and North Western Joint line. From there you could catch a direct train to Market Harborough. Regular passenger services were withdrawn 1953 - I once quoted John Baldock MP mourning them in the Commons - though summer specials from Leicester Belgrave Road to the East Coast resorts survived until 1962. This film, Youtube says, features Mr Lilley, the last signalman, and his grandson Nigel. It was shot by Nigel's father and he must have done as good facilities were withdrawn ...
Mary Reid writes in Liberal Democrat Voice: In the European Parliament earlier today, MEPs backed a Liberal Democrat amendment which will ensure that electronic cigarettes are available for sale on the same basis as tobacco.The original proposal from the Commission was that e-cigs should be treated as medicines, which would have restricted sales. But the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (the Group to which our Liberal Democrat team belongs) argued that they had a major role to play in reducing tobacco-related deaths. The amendment did require e-cigs to meet safety standards and for advertising to be restricted.We have ...
Tue 8th
21:22
Is that a Tory Peer and former member of Thatcher cabinet starring in the opening credits of The Sim...
This years Halloween Special of 'The Simpsons' has opening credits directed by the wonderful Guillermo del Torro and it's utterly fantastic, and worth watching just to see how many film references you can spot. But wait. Do my eyes deceive me? Who is that popping up around 1.49? It can't be? But...it's uncanny Is that Geoffrey Howe...? PS. While we're at it, is that a 1988 vintage Peter Mandelson on the left?
[IMG: nick clegg eu] Nick Clegg's passionate call this morning for everyone who cares about Britain's future in Europe to speak out will have been music to Lib Dem ears - and those of many more beyond. As Nick said, the antis have had it their way for far too long. Their arguments do not stand up to scrutiny and the pro-European case is just waiting to be made. As #whyIamIN started to trend on Twitter this morning, I started to think about just why we are better off in the EU, so taking my cue from Nick's speech I ...
Shropshire Council has not yet made a final decision on closing the Amenity Skip and Recycling Centre at Coder Road - known as the local tip to you and me. But it is only putting forward three options: closure, part-closure and closure. And the staff have been given their notices, so its curtains for the [...]
The BBC News Shropshire pages win this prestigious award. The report below makes everything clear: The British Ironwork Centre is calling on the public to donate spoons for the project. "It will make it even more special to have the community involved," said the centre's managing director Clive Knowles. "It's a problem as to how we could gather so many spoons as they are not readily available," he added. "And we also want many different types of spoon for the sculpture to make it as beautiful as we possibly can. "A sculpture made from one type of spoon would be ...
Maria Miller told the Commons today that the Privy Council had rejected the press' proposal for self-regulation. She said: The Committee of the Privy Council is unable to recommend the Press' proposal for a Royal Charter be granted Miller then outlined how the Royal Charter, as agreed by all three party leaders and the House [...]
Over the summer, I worked in Norman Baker's parliamentary and ministerial offices. I wasn't anything that important, just an intern, but I saw and heard a great deal. One thing I learnt while I was there was that Norman was one of our most effective members of the Government. He was into Transport in a way that I think I never will be and he knew his subject to the letter, possibly because he was the longest serving Transport minister. His instincts are liberal through and through and to this day I think he has a level of honesty and ...
The Northern Ireland Liberal Democrats wish to express their condemnation of, and disgust at, the actions of those who today saw fit to bring fear and disruption to bear against our sister party and its neighbours in East Belfast. Conflict ... Continue reading →
The Electoral Commission reports: [IMG: The Gambia flag] We have received several queries this week about the franchise of citizens of The Gambia following its decision to withdraw from the Commonwealth. Qualifying Commonwealth citizens meet the nationality criterion for registering to vote at all UK elections. As the definition of 'Commonwealth citizen' is set out in the British Nationality Act 1981, unless legislation is passed to remove The Gambia from the list of Commonwealth countries included in the Act, qualifying citizens from The Gambia will continue to be eligible for registration. No formal steps have yet been taken to remove ...
[IMG: European Union flag] In the European Parliament earlier today, MEPs backed a Liberal Democrat amendment which will ensure that electronic cigarettes are available for sale on the same basis as tobacco. The original proposal from the Commission was that e-cigs should be treated as medicines, which would have restricted sales. But the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (the Group to which our Liberal Democrat team belongs) argued that they had a major role to play in reducing tobacco-related deaths. The amendment did require e-cigs to meet safety standards and for advertising to be restricted. We have received ...
[IMG: Norman Baker] Nick Clegg's decision to reshuffle Jeremy Browne out of the Home Office and Norman Baker in has triggered a mini-furore, with plenty on the authoritarian right outraged at his appointment to the Home Office given he's the author of a book suggesting MI5 covered up the circumstances surrounding the death of Dr David Kelly. The best riposte I've seen has been from Jonathan Calder over at Liberal England: Some will question Norman's conspiracy theories about the death of David Kelly. To that, I would merely point out that in an age of Prism and Tempora, it is ...
The longevity of Ancient Egyptian civilisation is astonishing. More time passed between the unification of Egypt under the first pharaohs around 3,000 BC and its capture by Alexander the Great in 332 BC than has passed since. What is more much of the Ancient culture survived the Macedonian and Roman occupations and the early years [...]
Tue 8th
15:45
LibLink: Miriam González Durántez - Why I'm calling on brilliant British women to go b...
[IMG: González_Durántez] Miriam González Durántez has written for The Telegraph about how to provide good role models for girls. She writes: The UK, and Europe in general, is without any doubt one of the best places in the world to be a woman, if not the best. We can vote, we can work, we can travel, we have access to education, we can own and inherit property, we can speak freely, we are the masters of our own emotional lives. It is often easy to take all this for granted. And yet while men are able to toy with unlimited ...
Network Rail will be removing some trees and vegetation along the Manchester Airport railway line through Gatley starting from 28th October. The maps below show where the work will take place. [IMG: TREES1] [IMG: TREES2] [IMG: TREES3] [IMG: copyright]
With the Daily Mail hogging the nation's ire by slandering a dead WWII veteran, the Sun needed to do something pretty vile to get back onto the media naughty step. Well it managed it with its lurid front page claim that 1,200 people had been killed by 'mental patients' in the past decade. This is [...]
Despite progress across China's innovation system, significant problems persist which will require a fresh drive for reform, argues Cong Cao, in the second of our series on the prospects for Chinese science and innovation On 10 May 2012, in his testimony to the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission, Professor Denis Simon, Vice-Provost for International Strategic Initiatives at Arizona State University, and a long-time collaborator of mine, made this observation: "In the 1980s, when China S&T specialists were asked why China lags significantly behind the West and Japan in science and technology, most responses focused on three critical deficits: 1) ...
Many Liberal Democrats send Christmas Cards to every house in their ward several wards or the whole constituency. These are a good opportunity to remind people that you are there all year round, without a heavy political message. People usually add these cards to the rest they receive and so unlike Focus leaflets they tend [...]
In the past I have campaigned hard for more to be done to alleviate fuel poverty in the UK so I would like to invite local people to get involved [...]
Garston Park Church is holding a "Harvest of Hobbies" this weekend. Taking place on Saturday 12 October, the event is an exhibition of all sorts of arts and crafts produced by members of the Church. There'll be work there also by people from organisations that use the church. The "Harvest" runs from 10 to 12 30 and there'll be refreshments available too. Garston Park Church (old name Island Road Methodist Church) is in that bit of Garston where Garston Old Road meets up with Island Road and other roads. It's not actually on Island Road though!
Tue 8th
14:04
Tim Farron, MP for Westmorland and President of the Party, tells us why he is a proud Lib Dem!
(1) Why are you a Liberal Democrat? I am a liberal democrat because I believe in fairness, equality and opportunity for all. I do not believe markets should run rampant but neither do I believe the state should do everything. I am a liberal - I believe that the state has a role. My view is shaped by the 1980's [...]
Pleased as I am with the other benefits from our budget deal, the extra money for the provision of a £2 million robotic surgery system for the Singleton Hospital cancer centre capable of minimally invasive treatment of prostate and other cancers is also important. The machine enables the removal of tumours using keyhole surgery without many of the traditional side effects associated with the treatment of prostrate cancer This will be a tremendous boost for local cancer patients, and it is being delivered through the Welsh Liberal Democrat's Health Technology Fund, set up as part of last year's budget. Currently, ...
Call the Feline Rights Commission! How, in these equality sensitive times, did anyone think it appropriate to set up a beauty contest for MPs' dogs whilst ignoring all the much-loved cats in MPs' homes? Last year's winner of the Westminster Dog of the Year even got interviewed by Andrew Marr! Where's the fairness in that? When did you last see him talking with a cat? Of course, while dogs are owned by their humans, cats own people. So getting my fellow moggies to express our collective opposition to such undeserved canine fame is like – well – herding cats. But ...
Here's today's hand-picked selection that caught my interest... Tom Bennett: "Is the hunt for Gove now finally afoot with the appointment of Tristram?" – Opinion blog – Opinion blog – TES News Yep: "To claim that some kids 'are just better with their hands' is to commit the gravest act of social apartheid." http://bit.ly/GJ52Mb England's young people near bottom of global league table for basic skills | Education | theguardian.com .@SchleicherEDU presentatn of this y'day compelling > Eng's young people nr bottom of global league for basic skills http://bit.ly/18MaaII bit.ly Kudos to @MaajidNawa and @QuilliamF > Quilliam facilitates Tommy Robinson ...
Que se passe-t-il donc en Angleterre au niveau des services sociaux de protection de l'enfance ? Par : stefan.bastin@gmail.com - Octobre 2013. La situation anglaise n'est en rien comparable avec le fonctionnement dans les services sociaux belges francophones ou avec un certain nombre d'autres pays d'Europe. Les services sociaux anglais sont bien-sur fonctionnels et compétents. Mais,
I am a pro-European - that is no great revelation, I know. But sometimes you need to say it, clearly and unambiguously. The isolationist forces in Britain are on the rise - UKIP on the doorstep; Conservative politicians at their conference; familiar headlines in some of our newspapers each placing Britain's ills firmly at Brussels' door: too much immigration, too much crime, too much red tape. And every time Europe is back in the spotlight, their hostility towards it - this negative reaction to all things continental - drowns out the other voices in this debate. Pro-Europeans have to take ...
Reblogged from Michael Carchrie Campbell: At the start of the process discussing this issue, I was concerned that Scouting may have thrown out the concept of God from our Movement. I am glad that after the ten months of hard work on consultation, we have come to a sensible alternative wording for those young people...
38 Degrees are a well known pest around Westminster, clogging up MPs inboxes instead of actually making a point. There current bugbear is, not entirely unreasonably, the much criticised Lobbying Bill that is currently limping its way through Parliament. As usual, 38 Degrees have started from and fairly reasonable position, then lost the plot completely. Here [...]
Plaid Cymru and Welsh Liberal Democrats have secured investment that equates to £100 million by working together on the Welsh Government's latest budget. As a result of the deal the government's draft budget, which will be announced today, will include provision for • an Intermediate Care Fund • the doubling of the Pupil Deprivation Grant • a health technology and telemedicine fund • the Supporting People Programme. The Party of Wales leader Leanne Wood said: "Plaid Cymru wanted to secure a deal to help people in the short term - a deal that will make a practical difference to people's lives, now, today. This ...
[IMG: Royal Mail delivery trolley] Vince Cable has written to his Labour shadow, Chuka Umunna, stating that the sale price for the Royal Mail "reflects the fact the business brings risks, as well as assets such as property". When interviewed by the BBC yesterday, Umunna had listed a number of objections to the Government's valuation at £3.3billion, claiming that it could have been sold for £1billion more. In his response, Vince Cable said: It is irresponsible to imply that a share offering looks significantly undervalued. I think you should consider the risk that you may be influencing the decisions of ...
I had a short argument about targets last week. It made me feel quite nostalgic. I haven't had one for years, not since the coalition promised to do away with them. They haven't of course, though many targets have gone. In fact, they have introduced new ones in the form of payment-by-results contracts, turbo-charged with money. But for some reason, the arguments stopped. Maybe this is a sign that people are hankering a little after the old days, though they are not that different to today. Yes, I know that payment-by-results targets are supposed to be about 'outcomes' and old-fashioned ...
ALDC's James Baker discusses targeting friends of candidates during an election campaign. We have all come across the candidate who is convinced they will win their next election due to the sheer number of people they personally know. On some occasions this might also be given as an excuse for not going out and knocking [...]
posted The Blood is The Life 07-10-2013 http://t.co/RmNL2Xz5Q0 on #dreamwidth (tags: (from twitter) dreamwidth ) Diary of a Boa Constrictor If you've ever owned a snake you will recognise this SO MUCH (tags: ) Factcheck: The Sun's headline - "1,200 killed by mental patients" - is inaccurate | Full Fact (tags: ) No red box, no driver, no private office - life as a sacked minister sucks I don't like Tom Harris. But this article is really rather good, and might be a bit of Cold Comfort for Jezza Browne today. (tags: ) http://ind.pn/199mba2 @A_C_McGregor http://t.co/wZuXkc34Pu (tags: (from twitter) ...
Monday: It's reshuffle day, and there's been much surprise over the departure of widely-admired smooth operator Michael Moore from the Cabinet role of Secretary for Scotland to what we laughingly describe as the "lower guest suite" of Castle Carmichael (hot and cold running water... down the walls of your cell), and the equally unexpected defenestration of ultra-orange* Jeremy Browne, perceived as close to the Cap'n but also blamed for not stopping those pesky Tories' "Go Home" vans. But what they have in common is both being conducive to smooth relationships with the Conservatories; while their replacements are a touch more... ...
[IMG: Marx] The Daily Mail's ludicrous accusations that naval veteran Ralph Miliband hated his country conceal the relevant political question behind all this. Is Marxism a respectable philosophical position to take, or is it dangerous, or even evil? This debate will sometimes revolve around the overthrow of Russia's fledgeling democracy in November 1917, the subsequent mass murder and mass starvations committed by the Soviet regime under Lenin and Stalin, the suppression of the Prague Spring and so forth. To what extent can this be ascribed to the influence of Marx, or alternatively understood as a rejection of his philosophy? Now ...
Pampering Day @ St Werburgh's Church (386 Wilbraham Road M21 0UH) Saturday October 12th 11.00am- 4.00 pm Mini Manicures, Henna Hand Painting, HCPC Registered Podiatrist, Facials, Reflexology, Hand/Foot Massage, Indian Head Massage, Tai Chi/Chi Kung Class 3.00pm Portrait sketching by local artist Andy Bax, Children's face-painting Treatments offered at a fraction of the usual price. Free health checks and advice by KPS Pharmacy also Refreshments including indulgent cakes, herbal teas and fruit smoothies children's corner, chocolate tombola, raffle Treatments may be booked in advance Contact Kay on 0161 881 9717/07748471312 kay.khan@btinternet.com Raffle Prizes:- £10 Kingbee record voucher Packet of batteries ...
David Heath has been sacked as Minister of State for Agriculture and Food at Defra. In his place is North Cornwall Lib Dem MP Dan Rogerson, but at the more junior position of Parliamentary Under Secretary. [IMG: Dan Rogerson] In his letter to Heath, Nick Clegg said: I am very aware of the pressure on you within Defra over the last year, and I am particularly grateful to you for the clarity and objectivity you have brought to issues of animal and plant disease, your defence of environmental issues, your commitment to agriculture and rural areas, and the development of ...
Time, I think, to repost this video.
This morning we learn of the details of the rushed second phase of George Osborne and Nick Clegg's Help to Buy scheme, through Danny Alexander doing the usual tour of the television and radio studios. It is the wrong scheme, at the wrong time, and will not help the right people. The Treasury Select Committee has said as much. Indeed, many have given warnings ignored only by those in the Government – shamefully, of both coalition parties, only one would have been expected to be so out-of-touch. It will not help those who work hard and have a stable income ...
Tue 8th
08:33
UKIP confirm their SW regional list for #EP2014 with incumbent Earl of Dartmouth lead candidate
The UK Independence Party has confirmed its list of six candidates to contest the 2014 European elections in the South West region in May with incumbent MEP William the Earl of Dartmouth reselected by UKIP party members in the region to be head of the list. Second on the list is Dr Julia Reid, who is the European Parliamentary assistant of Trevor Colman, the other UKIP MEP for the region who
There are a number of reasons why this is good for the area. There is the general economic issue that involves people having jobs. Then there are additional houses and in particular some rented houses at reasonable rents (from Birmingham Municipal Housing Trust). Perhaps 20 houses will be available by May 2014 and the remaining 80 finished in 2015.
Last night, I was minute-taker at the latest Friends of Magdalen Green committee meeting. We had a very positive update on the Roseangle playpark improvements campaign and are delighted at the Courier's coverage of the launch of our 2014 Magdalen Green calendar, the proceeds of which will go towards the playpark campaign. Don't forget our Soup and Pudding Lunch on 7th December at Dundee West Church (11.30am to 1.30pm) as part of the West End Christmas Fortnight!
You can download a higher quality copy of this poster here.
