The recent news that Beamish Museum is to be awarded £600,000 by the Heritage Lottery Fund to complete the bid for a further £10 million towards the cost of the next phase of the Museum's development was celebrated tonight at an event for business people. If all goes to plan, Beamish will recreate a 1950s town centre. The former Airey prefabricated homes carefully dismantled and moved from
The House of Play & Education are launching a Garden adventure club to give children a chance to play outside and experiment with den building, gardening and other exciting activities. For more details see the poster below: [IMG: Untitled] It certainly sounds like fun!
A busy day today on local issues, including : * A morning site visit to speak with residents in Mitchell Street/Polepark Road/Benvie Road about the recent external cyclical works to their properties. Council officers from housing and architects also attended. * A meeting with the Pennycook and Sinderins Courts' Residents Association, at which we discussed a number of local issues. * A meeting of the Jericho House Support Group. The support group is a regular meeting at which a number of us discuss fundraising and other projects to support this important facility in the West End Ward, that assists those ...
[IMG: Copacabana] In memory of all the workers killed during the construction of the World cup venues. [IMG: Copa] photos by: Rodrigo_Soldon & laszlo-photo [IMG: Post to Twitter] Tweet This Post
Ah catfishing. For those of you who don't have any idea what catfishing is then here is the word catfish as described by the urban dictionary, 'A catfish is someone who pretends to be someone they're not using Facebook or other social media to create false identities, particularly to pursue deceptive online romances.' It came about because of a documentary someone made about someone on the internet and has spawned a successful TV show, although so far in season three it must be said it has been darker than the previous two season's. Last night we saw an episode where ...
[IMG: Rule Britannia] Everyone's right to life shall be protected by law. No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. No one shall be held in slavery or servitude. No one shall be required to perform forced or compulsory labour. Everyone has the right to liberty and security of person. In the determination of his civil rights and obligations or of any criminal charge against him, everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable time by an independent and impartial tribunal established by law. Everyone has the right to ...
The 9th of June 2003 was the worst day of my life as my father departed this life and left a bereaved family in his wake. My 2004 election communication. The following year was particularly tough. His first birthday, the first Christmas, the first New Year after his passing - they're always the toughest. It accumulated in the first anniversary of his loss a year later. Which made the following day, significant in an additional way. For the 10th of June 2004 saw me standing in front of Cardigan Guildhall, welcoming voters to the polling booth in the traditional Cardigan ...
Muff Winwood, older brother of Steve and the bass player with the Spencer Davis Group in its glory days, is interviewed by Shane O'Connor on BBC Coventry & Warwickshire. He talks about his later career in the music business as a producer and A&R man.
Tue 10th
19:56
Michael Gove: "There is something rather unBritish about seeking to define Britishness"
One of the questions that tormented Gordon Brown was what it means to be British. In 2006 he asked: "What is our equivalent for a national celebration of who we are and what we stand for? And what is our equivalent of the national symbolism of a flag in the United States in every garden?"This prompted me, bringing in Rudyard Kipling to support my case, to argue that there is something very unBritish about that sort of display. When, the following year, Brown proposed "to work with the public to develop a British statement of values," Prospect magazine asked 50 ...
Congratulations to azfamily.com for winning Headline of the Day - and thanks to the reader who nominated them.
How would you define British values? Indeed, in the 21stcentury can a country have a homogenous set of values at all? In one respect I am not the best person to tackle this subject as I self identify more as English than British but as well as kicking off a lively debate on my social media platforms. I thought I'd have a bash myself. For me, a country's values is what we want ourselves to be when we are our better selves. they don't have to be unique to our country but they are the standards we hold ourselves to ...
The Australian cricketer Gary Gilmour died today. For a short time in the mid 1970s he looked like becoming a test-class all rounder who would strengthen an already powerful side spearheaded by Dennis Lillee and Jeff Thomson. As Gideon Haigh says on Cricinfo: He struck 122 on his first outing for New South Wales in January 1972, and made 52 and took 4 for 75 on his Test debut against New Zealand two years later. He then excelled in English conditions when Australia toured England in 1975; his 6 for 14 in the World Cup semi-final against England and 5 ...
Tue 10th
18:59
Willie Rennie MSP: "I need you to get out and make our positive, sunshine case for a stronger Scotla...
[IMG: Edinburgh Castle, stunning in the morning sun] Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie sent this email to party members to spur them into action 100 days ahead of the Independence Referendum. Dear Friend, With 100 days until the referendum, Liberal Democrats have a golden opportunity to loudly state our case for home rule for Scotland in a federal United Kingdom. We know that the majority of people believe Scotland has the best of both worlds as part of the UK family. They also agree with our liberal message that Scotland benefits from a strong Scottish Parliament which shapes its ...
Some twenty years ago (or maybe thirty - how time flies when you're retired) some politician, was sounding off about how immigrants to Britain should adopt British values. Someone with a foreign-sounding name wrote to the Guardian asking exactly which British values he and his compatriots should adopt. Was it having the highest teenage pregnancy rate in Europe? Or putting their elderly relatives in homes and forgetting about them? Or maybe sending their sons to rampage around Europe in support of their football teams whilst getting plastered on lager and vomiting in the gutters? Yesterday, in response to the Education ...
Here are the Liberal Democrat entries in the top 100 political blogs as ranked by EBuzzing. It's welcome back again to Freedom Central and Richard Kemp, with Charlotte Henry (Digtial Politico) dropping out this month and Stephen Tall slipping into second place in the list for the first time. Given the many previous discussions about the male-dominated nature of political blogging (or more accurately, blogging about party and electoral politics in the narrower sense of 'politics'), it's interesting to note that of the top five blogs, two are by men, two by women and the fifth is a group blog ...
According to estimates from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) the population of England is projected to grow at double the pace of the rest of the UK over the next 23 years. By 2037 it is estimated that more than 61m people will live in England - a rise of 16%. In contrast, 1.9m will reside in Northern Ireland (up 10%), 5.7m will live in Scotland (+9%) and some 3.2m people will make their home in Wales (+8%). Almost two thirds of the increase will be a result of immigration, either through newcomers arriving or the increased birth rate ...
Two great pieces of news from the Queens Speech were Liberal Democrat successes in enhanced support for childcare and better protection for pub landlords. Two easily identifiable Lib Dem 'wins' in this year's Queen's Speech were childcare support and enhanced protection for pub landlords. ALDC members can download Lib Dem HQ's template campaigning materials on [...]
[IMG: paddy ashdown - paul walter] In a powerful article on Huffington Post, Paddy Ashdown writes in support of UNICEF's campaign to end sexual violence against children in conflict. He writes: During my years in Bosnia, both during the war and afterwards I heard and saw evidence of horrific stories of mass rape and sexual violence committed during the war. Thousands of women and children suffered terrible abuse and the physical and mental scars could stay with survivors for the rest of their lives. Years later, sexual violence still remains entrenched in conflict zones around the world and children are ...
Expenses Returns for the Local Elections 2014 We all know that they have to be done but getting round to the election expenses is most activists least enjoyable election task. Your local authority should supply you with a set of election expenses forms. There are 3 basic forms to be submitted for each candidate: 1. [...]
[IMG: Liberal democrats] Congratulations to Ryan Coetzee and his team for giving us the official new Government policy of a 'Stronger Economy and a Fairer Society'. The problem with a really good line like that and similar advertising slogans such as "It's Good to Talk" is that they become not just commonly accepted and universally recognised but they also become generic. As such they completely lose their power to influence choice or differentiate one product from another. "It's Good to Talk" ended up not only promoting BT but also selling a lot of mobile phones for their competitors. I know ...
Britain is ill-served by its news media. There has been a growing kerfuffle about Muslim-dominated schools in Birmingham. The issues dominating this in media coverage are the extremism of some Muslims, and the explosive relations between the Education Secretary, Michael Gove, and the Home Secretary, Theresa May, which they assume is all to do with Mrs May's leadership ambitions. This wantonly ignorant coverage is not only damaging community relations, but it failed to shine any light on the failure of the coalition's Conservative-led education policy. This matters because this policy has been given nearly a free run in the media, ...
This spreadsheet is part of the 2013 Public Expenditure Statistical Analysis. In this you can see the lid being taken off public spending in fact in 2001. This was reasonable up to a point, but it then resulted in increases in spending that were far too optimistic (in terms of GDP) and resulted in our financial problems being at the higher end of countries in Europe rather than the middle or
[IMG: bite the ballot] Last week, I was encouraged to see more political parties coming around to the (long-held Liberal Democrat) view that we need to make voter registration easier, accessible and engaging, and allow young people to register from an early age. Only then can we seek to inspire future generations to take a stake in democracy and truly make 'politics' open to all citizens. To this end, today is the formal first reading of my Voter Registration Bill in the House of Lords. I very much hope that Members from all parties (and none) welcome and support its ...
The Welsh Government need to do more to address the standards of care given to young people in Wales who are experiencing mental health difficulties. Today we will be discussing a Welsh Government motion noting "Welsh Government action to improve mental health and well-being in Wales". Once again it seems clear to me that this Welsh Labour Government has no understanding of the situation being faced on a day-to-day basis by literally hundreds of young people in Wales. We have tabled amendments to the motion calling for more to be done to prevent young people being put on adult psychiatric ...
In April a UKIP candidate for election in Southend posted on his Facebook that he was a bit pissed off and intended to move back to Cambridge in August. A month later and he won election to Southend Council. He has subsequently deleted the Facebook post but for some reason is is providing a bit of a stir and I feel compelled to defend the candidate. Like others – I had seen the post before the election. I didn't feel compelled to blog on it because I didn't feel it was a story that needed to be written. It isn't ...
Now this is my kind of technology.
[IMG: London December 9 2013 064 Thames Low Tide (4) Parliament] The Liberal Democrats' Federal Executive met last night in a Westminster Committee room looking out on a grey and brooding Thames. The meeting had a bit of a comedy start with a last minute change of venue leaving member scurrying from one end of the Parliamentary Estate to the other. The major item of business was, of course, discussion about the recent elections. Several Federal Executive members had consulted widely amongst members to get their views. Only Candy Piercy, though, had been organised enough to compile the main themes ...
The Liberal Democrats' Federal Executive met last night in a Westminster Committee room looking out on a grey and brooding Thames. The meeting had a bit of a comedy start with a last minute change of venue leaving member scurrying ... Continue reading →
Without great fanfares I note a D66 speaker has been added to the agenda at the Social Liberal Forum conference. Lousewies van der Laan has been both at Dutch MP and an MEP. There is a video of her speaking in Denmark about sustainability that can been viewed here Way back in the mid 1970's Radical Youth for Europe, which I then chaired, organised a fringe meeting with D66 . The speakers included Richard Wainwright and Laurens Jan Brinkhorst later to become undersecretary of state of foreign affairs and a minister of agriculture. Furthermore he was the leader of the ...
Expenses Returns for the Local Elections 2014 We all know that they have to be done but getting round to the election expenses is most activists least enjoyable election task. Your local authority should supply you with a set of election expenses forms. There are 3 basic forms to be submitted for each candidate: 1. [...]
[IMG: Liberal Democrat Conference 2011] There are many issues facing the Liberal Democrats at the moment and there has been much discussion about these issues. But one which has been overlooked, in my opinion, is the need to apply our traditional enthusiasm for constitutional reform to ourselves At the moment the structure of the party is essentially a replica of a national political system. We have constituencies of local parties whose members (the voters) elect a local government in the form of a party executive and who also elect voting representatives (MPs) by proportional representation to send to conference (parliament) ...
David Laidler's EconTalk with Russ Roberts is worth hearing all the way through. Laidler was one of the researcher assistants to Friedman and Schwartz for their Monetary History, and it is a pleasure to hear two people who can airily refer to "Milton" by his first name, and suggest what he might have thought. He [...]
Tue 10th
12:25
Watch and laugh: Clarke and Dawe - The Preferred Prime Minister Stands Accused of Ambition
More comedy genius from Australia's Clarke and Dawe: You can also watch this on YouTube.
[IMG: StephenWilliams1] New homes will save householders more than £200 a year in fuel bills and cut carbon emissions to zero as part of world beating standards to be introduced from 2016. As the coalition sets out its legislative priorities for the year ahead in this week's Queen's Speech, the government confirms it will go further by strengthening energy efficiency requirements for more insulation and renewable energy sources such as solar panels. And since making all new homes zero carbon 'on site' is not always physically feasible or cost effective for house builders, the government will also introduce a system ...
I want to begin with the most important thing to say this month: thank you. From the outset, we knew these were going to be a tough set of elections. But across the country our activists, councillors and grassroots campaigners pulled out all the stops to fight a strong, passionate campaign. Since the results, I [...]
[IMG: Willy Brandt] This May marked the 40th anniversary of the resignation of Willy Brandt, chancellor of West Germany from 1969 to 1974, in the wake of a political scandal in which a close aide was revealed to be a spy for East Germany. Despite the way in which he was forced to leave office, Brandt and his government (a coalition of socialists and liberals) left behind a legacy of radical reform that had turned West Germany into a fairer society, and remains an inspiration to progressives today. Elected in 1969, Brandt inspired many people with his calls for greater ...
We now have the publication of most of inquiries and inspections relating to Trojan Horse. There will be more reports, but not so much into individual schools. It is important to remember where this started. There was the trojan horse document and then Khalid Mahmood MP said: 'There has been a serious bid to take over most of the schools in the east and south of the city.' There are, of
Local papers are reporting that Devon and Cornwall will be losing police officers over the summer to help out in other parts of the UK. Local officers will be helping out with such things as a NATO summit in Wales and the Northern Ireland marching season. Cornwall is a low crime area, but accordingly we have comparatively low police numbers. The Conservative Police Commissioner, Tony Hogg, has made a lot of his aim of keeping police officer numbers above the 3000 mark, but it seems this level will be breached for the first time over the summer as up to ...
(This is chapter four of the children's book I've been slowly serialising on here. Chapters 1, 2, 3) Sundays were boring. School was fine — it wasn't much fun putting up with all the other girls talking about boys and pop stars and soaps, but they'd learned not to bother trying to talk to Holly. [...]
Really? Are We Still Genre Shaming People For The Books They Like? (tags: ) BBC News obit of Rik Mayall Ade Edmondson: "There were times when Rik and I were writing together when we almost died laughing. They were some of the most carefree stupid days I ever had, and I feel privileged to have shared them with him. "And now he's died for real. Without me. Selfish bastard." ♡♡♡ (tags: ) 150 years of image manipulation before photoshop (tags: ) Scientists dispute whether computer 'Eugene Goostman' passed Turing test "We have not passed the Turing test. We are not ...
Chances are you have already seen a story claiming that research has shown that hurricanes with female names are more dangerous because people see them as less threatening and take fewer precautions. I would suggest that at an instinctive level this always looked rather unlikely. Now National Geographic suggests that Jeff Lazo a social scientist [...]
One of the risks of turning on the telly before 9am is being assailed by relentlessly cheery, cheesy teleshopping adverts. I caught one this morning, the TV still being tuned to the Horror Channel from last night's Doctor Who (if you've not been watching their terrific selection, start today: they've got three showings of The Deadly Assassin, simply the best story in the series' history), but before my dulled not-a-morning-person reflexes could switch over, I was captivated. Or, more accurately, laughing like a hyena. A new food blender for dieters? Yeuch. But wait! It has two unique selling points. A ...
[IMG: General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi] The newly crowned president of Egypt recently took time out of his busy schedule posing in sunglasses to address the nation's General Assembly. "In the long history that goes back thousands of years, our homeland did not witness democratic transfer of power. Now, for the first time, the President-elect shakes hands with the outgoing President, and together they sign a power transfer document in an unprecedented occasion." Yes, one military stooge handed over the reins of power to someone who had a whole lot more power already, and who furthermore would have crushed the incumbent ...
[IMG: school lockers] Yesterday a commenter on Lib Dem Voice asked why the party had not responded to the Trojan Horse allegations about schools in Birmingham. Now I make no claim to any knowledge about the affair, apart from what I read in a decidedly partisan press, but I can at least raise some questions. I was struck this morning by an article in the Guardian by the assistant principal on one of the schools that has been downgraded from Outstanding to Inadequate. Lee Donaghy writes under a headline 'Ofsted's slur on the Muslim community of Park View School': ... ...
This pleasing piece of trivia, linking the authors of the two great English dystopian novels of the 20th century, comes from the "five fascinating facts about George Orwell's 1984" on Interesting Literature. Huxley taught French to the young Eric Blair at Eton.
I have today launched my June 2014 Update to the West End Community Council. Subjects covered include:Update on Perth Road Branch of Royal Bank of Scotland closureRoads repairsBlackness Avenue - tree bedThe Community Council meets this evening at Logie St John's (Cross) Church Hall at 7pm - all residents welcome. You can download my Update here.
Turbine wrangles Eric Pickles has been accused of killing off the wind turbine industry after turning down 10 out of 12 applications in the past year. In total, Mr Pickles has intervened in 39 planning disputes about wind turbines. Gemma Grimes, director of onshore renewables at RenewableUK, said: "By doing this, he's undermining the fundamental principles of England's impartial planning process. Frankly, his intervention looks political, and that's unnerving to developers of all infrastructure projects." Meanwhile, RSPB Scotland is campaigning against a proposal from SSE to put up 47 turbines on an area of north Sutherland currently the subject of ...
There are two reasons to be a little sceptical about reports that a computer has finally passed the Turing Test. A little background: this is the one set out by the computer pioneer Alan Turing to decide mathematically if computers could 'think'. The reports suggest that 33 per cent of judges were convinced by a programme which persuaded them that the computer they were communicating with was a Ukrainian teenager called Eugene. That was above the threshold set by Turing back in 1950 so - if it really has been passed - they will be breaking open the champagne in ...
Following on from my piece a few days ago regarding Welsh UKIP MEP Nathan Gill's former employment of migrants in his businesses, the Hull Daily Mail has a new angle. They have spoken to a woman who was formerly employed by Mr. Gill, alongside migrant workers, who claims that he treated them better than his British staff: Mr Gill charged some migrant workers £50 a week to share a room with five other people while they worked for him. The woman, who asked not to be named, said staff worked 70 hours a week but were only paid £180. But ...
On Monday 9th June Nick Clegg made a speech at Bloomberg where he sets out his vision for the Liberal Democrats going into the 2015 general election. You can read the text at He starts with dealing with some specific suggestions people have made about the campaign and a particular allegation levelled at the Liberal Democrats before setting out his vision. However the things he didn't address are the belief that some party members have that the public no longer trust Nick Clegg and no longer listen to him. This is why some are calling for Nick to resign. ...
