Thanks to Youtube for recommending this. It knows what I like.
Confused Cats Against Feminism has received a lot of media coverage in recent days. The Women's Blog om the Guardian site is one example. Me? I just like the pictures of cats.
One of the most intriguing characteristics of blogging is its flexibility. You can find plenty of people willing to offer their views on how you should go about blogging if you want to maximize your audience and the like. But, while some of these hints and tips may well be of value, I'm not sure there is a formula for success. While the received wisdom might be that posts of around 500-600 words will hit the spot most effectively, there are hugely effective bloggers who have mastered the art of the meaningful single paragraph or, indeed, single sentence post. Or ...
The Liberal Democrats are promising to place Britain's forests in a protected trust to stop them ever being sold off, as was proposed in the early months of the Coalition. According to the Guardian, this measure will be contained in a nature bill that is being drawn up by the party to bring in greater protections for the environment. It will be put to the party's autumn conference for possible inclusion in the its manifesto for the next general election. Dan Rogerson appears to be the moving spirit behind it. Its reports says: Under the plans, the Lib Dems are ...
I stumbled across this earlier today via Facebook. And it is well worth sharing...
I am not surprised to learn from FCC that my policy motion on IPv6 has not been accepted for debate at Conference in Glasgow this autumn. The polite rejection reads: I am writing to let you know that the conference committee decided not to select your motion Connecting More Devices to the Internet for debate [...]
[IMG: Car dashboard. Photo courtesy of http://www.freeimages.com/photo/1445913 - some rights reserved] After a slow start, Britain is starting to catch up on putting the right measures in place to capture the coming driverless car revolution: The UK government has announced that driverless cars will be allowed on public roads from January next year. It also invited cities to compete to host one of three trials of the tech, which would start at the same time. In addition, ministers ordered a review of the UK's road regulations to provide appropriate guidelines. As I've said before: Think just how quickly driverless cars ...
This is one of a number of Free Speech Bites available on the Index of Censorship website.
A really rather good post by Slate Star Codex on libertarianism, non-self-regulating systems, transhumanism and races to the bottom. Just don't make the mistake I did of reading the comments — or even worse, of replying to them... The one good thing in those comments — a link to Design For A Brain by William [...]
It's all getting grumpy out there about Ludlow Skip Hire. At my request, the Environment Agency provided a statement yesterday about rats. In summary, the EA says rats are not coming from the waste site. Last Friday night, just as I popped into the Church Inn for a pint, I found a message on my [...]
I am not a huge football fan. Unless it involves Inverness Caledonian Thistle, I really don't care and even then it's more of a spiritual thing. I don't actually need to watch 22 men kick the bag of wind around the field. But my antipathy to the game wasn't the only reason my heart sank when I saw the new Liberal Democrat campaign, "Bring the 2018 World Cup to England" this morning. Certainly, having just had a month of nothing but football anywhere, I was screaming for respite. It's bad enough on the other side of the world but if ...
Wed 30th
16:34
Social Liberal Conference: Farron on the Radical challenge now the Regan/Thatcher/ Blair consensus i...
On the day Tim Farron's Beveridge lecture was a triumph. The 40 minutes speech was punctuated by warm and spontaneous applause and at the end the delegates rose to their feet without prompting to give him an extended ovation. The speech made folk feel better about themselves and their politics. It has been a rough time for those who come out of the radical tradition. Here, at last, was someone who was speaking about their dreams and hopes. The speech's great virtue was that it was forward looking. It was not picking over the bones of the coalition corpse. It ...
The following message was received from the Public Protection team at Shropshire Council this afternoon: In June and July Shropshire Council received two calls to our Customer Service Centre regarding vermin sightings in Temeside. One caller was referred to our Pest Control Service but declined to arrange a treatment visit, the other caller supplied their [...]
For those of you that don't know, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) is a quasi-judicial authority, tasked with providing independent scrutiny of the marketing communications industry; specifically ensuring that advertising is not misleading, harmful or offensive. The Chairman of the ASA is appointed by Advertising Standards Board of Finance (ASBOF) - who then appoints 12 Council members to preside over various cases put before them (frequently by members of the public complaining about advertisements they see). Council members are supposedly selected by the Chairman to reflect a diversity of background and experience. This of course only works if the Chairman ...
[IMG: Libby] Join or support us because we Liberal Democrats believe in... Respect for individual freedom, respect for privacy and tolerance in a diverse open society Fairness between governments and their citizens, fairness between employers and their employees, fairness in all our dealings with each other Fairness in sharing the prosperity we and others all help to build, fairness in the reward for effort and enterprise, fairness in the burdens that must be carried People, parties and nations working together to improve our lives and to put an end to conflict, exploitation and discrimination – however these may arise Helping ...
Bats and dragonflies hunting over the garden. The grapevine is doing well this year. Japanese anemone in flower. Lavender for the bees. Peacocks, red admirals, small tortoiseshell, large whites and meadow brown butterflies in the garden this week. Found this lovely violet ground beetle hunting under a planter I was clearing out. Don't forget, you can take part in the Big Butterfly Count up till 10th August ~ details here.
Wed 30th
15:16
Liberal Democrat scientists tell Juncker to keep Scientific Adviser amid pressure from environmental...
New EI Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has had lots of conflicting advice about what to do about the post of the Commission's Chief Scientific Officer. Environmental NGO's seem to want to get rid of the post while research organisations want to keep it. The Guardian reports: The NGOs called the role, which was introduced in 2012 by current EC president José Manuel Barroso and has been occupied since then by a biologist at the University of Aberdeen, Prof Anne Glover, "fundamentally problematic". Their letter argued that the non-elected role concentrated too much influence in one person, undermining research by the ...
Police are appealing for anyone who was travelling on the A432 Badminton Road north of the Wick Wick roundabout last Friday evening (25th July) to contact them on 101. They may have important information about a fatal collision. The incident happened at 4.41pm when a Mini Cooper, which was emerging from Cuckoo Lane, was in collision with a motorcycle travelling along the A432 Badminton Road from the direction of Wick Wick roundabout. Sadly a man in his 30s died at the scene, despite receiving medical attention. Police believe the road was quite busy at the time of the incident with ...
Wed 30th
13:45Opinion: Intergenerational Fairness: Are we really building a fair future for our young people?
The challenges that young people face today are considerably different to what the previous generations faced. The baby boomers spent much of their lives enjoying a resilient and rewarding economy, with prospects of owning a house regarded as being the norm. These days, as a young person, it's not even a realistic goal, let alone normal. Between 2001 and 2011, house prices rose three times faster than wages. As a double whammy, we saw the recession hit wages and young people's employment prospects particularly hard. Whilst unemployment is dropping, too many of us know young people settling for part-time work, ...
[IMG: Jean-Claude Juncker] Dear Mr Juncker, We write to you on the subject of the appointment of a new Chief Scientific Adviser to the President of the European Commission; a post held until recently by Professor Anne Glover. We commend the record of Professor Glover, the first postholder in this position, both in her role as an adviser and in promoting the pursuit and appreciation of science in Europe. As a membership association promoting sound scientific advice within the Liberal Democrat Party and the United Kingdom, we were disconcerted to read the letter addressed to you from nine NGOs asking ...
Once again we have news that some bankers have been playing the system to suit their own advantage. Incredibly it appears that traders from at least one bank were gaming the system that had actually been set up by the ... Continue reading →
One of Game of Thrones least popular characters is also one of its most interesting [Spoilers incoming] Den of Geek recently ran an article on "Sticking up for the unpopular kids in geek TV's playground." Now I don't think this was a wholly successful effort – it will take an awful lot to convince me [...]
You may have noticed, either in the media, or by the bollards that have started appearing on the M60/M62 about the major roadworks which are taking place on the M60 and M62 over the next three years (to 2017). The Government's Highways Agency is making the motorway from Junction 8 We are working to improve the M60 by making it a smart motorway between junction 8 of the M60 (Trafford Centre) round to and junction 20 of the M62 (Rochdale/Oldham). [IMG: Screenshot 2014-07-30 13.25.08] A 'Smart Motorway' uses variable speed limits, traffic flow sensors, traffic information signs to help the ...
Plans for opencast mining at Marley Hill are back on hold after a decision yesterday by Co Durham's planning committee to reject the application by UK Coal to extract one million tonnes of coal from a site south of the village. The situation is very complicated however as Gateshead Council has granted planning permission. The site is mainly in Gateshead but part of it crosses the border into Co
[IMG: War of the Words HG Wells exhibion logo] Sandgate Parish Council and Sandgate Community Trust that the H G Wells' exhibition at 82 Sandgate High Street will open on Friday 1st August. Funding for this has kindly been granted by Shepway District Council via its High Street Innovation Fund. We are looking for volunteers to work in the exhibition. Training will be given although a knowledge of computer usage would be desirable. The most important thing is to be welcoming and prepared to take an active interest in HG Wells. We will be selling books, postcards, notelets and prints ...
Over the next twelve months there is a trial planned for large fences alongside the motorway at junction 18. These are part of a trial into the effectiveness of physical barriers in stopping vehicle pollutants, namely Oxides of Nitrogen (NOx), from impacting on sensitive receptors, such as local residents. The trial location is to the east of Simister Island, in close proximity to Egypt Lane. The trial is being carried out on farm land which has been leased by the Highways Agency contractor. The barriers will be completely removed on completion of the trial and the land fully reinstated. The ...
Wed 30th
13:07
If you want to stop Russia, calling for England to host the 2018 World Cup is a bad idea
One of the small highlights of the recent World Cup for me was the BBC showing the official FIFA World Cup films on BBC Two on weekend mornings. In the 1982 film – G'Ole! – there's a moment near the end when the camera pans over the crowd for the final and shows a Colombia 1986 banner, the only time that tournament ever appeared on camera. Colombia had been selected to host the 1986 World Cup but withdrew from hosting later in 1982 because of a host of domestic and economic problems. In the words of President Betancur: "We have ...
Enrolment started this week on Bury's Adult Learning courses. A wide range of courses are available ranging from: computer courses, cake decoration, GCSE English, Languages to British Sign Language. [IMG: Screenshot 2014-07-30 12.59.04] You can download a full guide here, and this part of the Council Website has full details about fees, courses and how to apply.
[IMG: Clegg] Typing out that title seemed weirdly redundant, like calling an article "Water: good cure for thirst". It is so abundantly obvious that stripping Russia of the 2018 World Cup is the least that should happen post-MH17. Yet a Tory MP described the DPM's call for this as "pretty amateur" adding that "a great deal is going to happen between then and now". I am trying to decipher this last quote and I'm still struggling. So is this an allusion to a possible "Russian Spring"? And if that seems likely, isn't holding the World Cup somewhere that we aren't ...
TWENYTWO new special constables are to be presented with their warrant cards at an attestation ceremony after completing 13 weeks of training. The ceremony will take place on Wednesday, August 6, from 7pm at the Cambridgeshire Constabulary HQ in Huntingdon. Head of Cambridgeshire Special Constabulary, Victor Kerlin said: "We are always pleased with the recruitment of new special constables. "The new officers are part of our on-going recruitment campaign to attract local people who wish to contribute to policing and community safety. "The level of dedication, effort and flexibility provided by our special officers is a matter of immense pride ...
In a bid to encourage the development of driverless cars on British roads, Vince Cable has announced a £10 million investment for research projects. Currently, driverless cars are only allowed on private roads. However, with funding from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and the Department for Transport, driverless cars are expected to begin testing on public roads in 2015. From today, interested local research institutions will be able to apply for funding by submitting a business case. The Department of Transport will also launch a review of road regulations to remove red tape and provide legal framework to ...
A scheme that I have championed to cut the cost of parking season tickets across Cornwall has resulted in additional profits of more than £74,000 for the council - as well as happier local residents and drivers. The previous situation was that motorists were being charged a lot for season tickets. They might be getting a discount on the daily pay and display rate, but that discount wasn't a lot. And the attitude of the previous, Conservative-led, administration seemed to be that regular price rises would automatically be paid by drivers. And so commuters voted with their feet and abandoned ...
The Council has received an application for a premise licence for Barbeerian, 84 Bury old Road, Whitefield. They have applied for Sale of Alcohol for the following times: Monday to Sunday from 10.00am until 23.00pm The objection period ends soon – next Tuesday 5 August 2014. If you need any further information please contact a member of the licensing team on 253 5208 or let me know if you need me to object as local Councillor. Tim
I suspect I'm not the only one to be delighted and relieved about the announcement this week about new protections to be put in place that will restrict "Fracking" in sensitive areas. Geological evidence shows that fracking could lead to a significant disruption to the hot water spring waters on which the tourism of the World Heritage City of Bath depends and could damage the water pressure without which we could see buildings in the city collapse. Even though the latest British Geological Survey Maps show that the three main areas where large amounts of shale oil and gas exists ...
Launceston's £1 all day Saturday parking deal has been extended at least until the end of March 2015, thanks to work by the town's Liberal Democrat councillors and local businesses. Cornwall Council first ran the deal - which allows drivers to park in one of the Cornwall Council owned car parks all day on a Saturday for just £1 - for three months from April to June. That was extended by a month, but the authority has now confirmed that the deal will run until the end of the financial year at least. This is great news for the town ...
Tracey Gough fought the Underhill ward on Weymouth and Portland Council for UKIP in May. Now she's contesting a Town Council election. Take a look at the description she has used. Download this file
Sir Menzies Campbell MP and local Councillor Tim Brett today urged businesses in North East Fife to get behind efforts to provide 100 local young people with the chance to gain work experience through apprenticeships or training opportunities.The new campaign is aiming to persuade local businesses to sign up to taking on one or more apprentices or trainees to create a 100 new opportunities for local young people.The 100 Apprentices Challenge will be launched at Watts of Cupar on 8 August 2014 and all employers - large or small, whether they've employed apprentices and trainees before or not - are ...
I had a brief lesson yesterday evening about what is wrong with administration, public and private, in the UK after unfortunately entangling myself with the Direct Line call centre. This is no bureaucracy, after all. It isn't the public sector. But unfortunately, in a weak moment some years ago, I seemed to have taken out car insurance with them. My call was to facilitate what should have been a simple business of extending my car insurance to cover a brief drive in France later this month. It was the culmination of a private sector bureaucracy encounters while undergoing the trauma ...
[IMG: Liberal Democrat badge. Photo courtesy of Paul Walter, Newbury - some rights reserved] Total Politics magazine posed this question to Dan Hodges, Tim Bale and myself for the July edition, with me looking at the Liberal Democrats. Here's what my crystal ball produced. Hunt very closely amongst the very oldest people in every last bungalow and care home around the country and you might just find someone who was alive when the Liberal Democrats or their predecessors last won a general election. That was back in 1910, a mere 104 years ago. With the oldest Briton, at the time ...
You have to feel sorry for black cats. As the Telegraph says, for centuries they have faced suspicion, hostility and even death as a result of the bad luck they are said to carry with them, but now they are having to face a new challenge, the rise of the 'selfie'. The paper reports that hundreds of balck cats are being abandoned as their owners complain that they do not photograph as well as their lighter and brighter-coloured counterparts, making them less popular with those who enjoy posting self-portraits with their pets on sites such as Facebook. They add that ...
On the face of it, for HAMAS to simply fire its unguided rockets into Israel, in the hope some may hit something important, or kill someone, is stupid. Nothing HAMAS can do will inflict any serious damage on the state of Israel, they are just annoying Israel (a lot). So why are they doing it, assuming their actions are rational? Their actions may not be rational of course, they may be so consumed by hatred of Israel that they are striking out any way they can. But assuming they are acting in a rational manner, what can they hope to ...
From the Council: Contractors working on behalf of Vodafone will be undertaking works on a telecoms mast on Kingsway, Cheadle, close to the junction with Broadway outside the Kingsway School. These works require the use of a single lane closure on 5th August 2014 between the hours of 9.30am and 3.00pm only.
Wed 30th
10:30
Austerity and honesty. Will any of the parties level with the voters about what the post-2015 cuts w...
[IMG: con home cartoon] Here's my latest The Other Side column for ConservativeHome, published here on Tuesday. There were two points I wanted to make. First, that austerity is real, as there is a strain of right-wing commentators who argue it's a chimera. And secondly, that while it's set to continue beyond 2015 under all three parties' plans, those of the Tories are spectacularly incredible/un-credible. My thanks as ever to the site's editors, Paul Goodman and Mark Wallace, for giving a Lib Dem space to provoke – constructively, I hope. The Coalition has been careful to avoid triumphalism over the ...
'Galaxy Quest': The Oral History – The cast and crew explain how it came to be. The Higher Sociopathy – "Rather than confront reality, the philosopher of war resorts to reason. If the problem is the mismatch between the terrible grandeur of the means and the pedestrian poverty of the ends, don't rethink your means, much less the war; simply inflate the ends." Education should be about progress, not prostituted as a means to earn more – Alex Andreou on the value of education as a good in itself. How 'competitiveness' became one of the great unquestioned virtues of contemporary ...
[IMG: heritage] Explore Hemel Hempstead Old Town's Heritage While English Heritage operates the National Blue Plaque Scheme in which a blue plaque is placed on a building where an individual of national historical importance lived, Dacorum BC has developed this concept together with with Dacorum Heritage Trust volunteers by marking places of general interest in Hemel Hempstead's Old Town. It includes buildings and sites of local historical importance with key facts about the areas architectural, historic and social history. The trail features the history of the Old Town and covers from Queensway to Piccotts End. It celebrates a significant number ...
It might be time for Richard Dawkins to step away from the internet (tags: ) The most uplifting body image message you will see today (tags: ) Vote Moeen Ali for best beard in the England Cricket Team! @bbctms (tags: ) Why is the world of sport less female-friendly than a war zone? (tags: ) Leader of Green Party writes article I completely agree with shocker (tags: ) Beware The Department of Dirty! (tags: ) No need for revenge porn law, peers say :/ (tags: ) 20 People you didn't know were in Hammer films (only 2 of which *I* ...
Following the cabinet reshuffle earlier this month, the push from within the Conservatives to repeal the Human Rights Act and remove the UK from the European Convention on Human Rights with a British Bill of Rights in its place now seems firmly in the forefront of our political debate. The most notable change was clearly William Hague's surprise departure from Foreign Secretary and announcement that he would stand down as an MP next year but the most significant change was the sacking of Dominic Grieve from Attorney General. Serving as the Chief Legal advisor in the government, he had provided ...
Aside from the power we all have to ask for information, the law gives us two powerful legal rights to obtain information from other organisations. The first of these, the Freedom of Information Act you have probably heard about. Freedom of Information Act requests (FOIA requests) can be used by individuals to obtain information from [...]
Residents in Logie Gardens have complained to me about the state of part of the ground on the street's south side adjacent to Pine Court's car park. As you can see below, its overgrown and unsightly, but there was some doubt as to ownership. The non-Home Scotland housing close by to the west was built by Glenagnes Developments Limited, the adjacent roadway is adopted by the City Council and the remainder of the area is owned by Home Scotland.The City Council kindly ascertained for me that the parcel of overgrown ground was sold to the former Cleghorn Housing Association in ...
Just a few thoughts on the transport implications of the massive Giants event in Liverpool over the last weekend. The advice from Merseytravel was very clear – come into Liverpool by train or bus and the emphasis seemed to be very much 'by train'. But was this advice right? We travelled into Liverpool on both Saturday and Sunday. On Saturday we drove to Bootle and got a train at Bootle Oriel Road Station. The train we got on the Southport – Liverpool Line was packed but OK and we got off at Moorfields Station. Coming back though was a very ...
From this morning's Guardian: A "right to be forgotten" - enforcing the removal of online material - is wrong in principle and unworkable in practice, a parliamentary committee has said. The House of Lords home affairs, health and education EU sub-committee has condemned regulations being drawn up by the European commission and a recent landmark judgment by the European court of justice (ECJ) in Luxembourg. The study supports the coalition government's opposition to the EU proposals on the grounds that search engines should not be made responsible for the content of the internet.
The Evening Standard reports: The controversial mayor of Tower Hamlets is to face a High Court trial over claims of electoral fraud. Four petitioners today won their bid to expose Lutfur Rahman's election victory to a full inquiry after allegations that voters were promised council houses if they voted for him. They claimed Rahman's team used a "variety of forms" of fraud when he won the mayoral ballot by 3,000 votes in May... The court refused an application to have the case heard outside the Tower Hamlets area. The petitioners had claimed that "loud and intimidating" supporters of the mayor ...
#78986519 / gettyimages.com When I looked for some photos from the set of Blow-Up on GettyImages, I did not find any I could embed here. But the video of the film's locations then and now has proved popular. What I did find was some embeddable pictures taken of David Hemmings when he was 12 and in Venice to sing the role of Miles in the premiere of Benjamin Britten's opera The Turn of the Screw. Yes, before he was an actor he was a singer. Though there are questions to be asked about Britten's relationships with boys, Hemmings always maintained ...
