When the mining industry petered out on the Stiperstones in the 20th century, many of the remains were disguised by the planting of conifers. In recent years the Back to Purple project has seem those conifers cleared and the original vegetation of heather and bilberry (whinberry in Shropshire) restored.
"@SnoozeInBrief: Yeah, an independent Scotland would see a completely new style of politics. #indyref pic.twitter.com/LP5ePulhCH" Lol or cry — Kevin Maguire (@Kevin_Maguire) September 13, 2014 This tweet reminds me of something I blogged in 2012 after Alex Salmond refused to meet the Dalai Lama during his visit to Scotland: I am instinctively sympathetic to the idea of small nations, but today's events have done nothing to make the prospect of an independent Scotland more attractive. They have reminded me of Alex Salmond's appearance before the Leveson Inquiry. You can read his evidence on the inquiry website, but this quote from ...
Sat 13th
21:42
William Hague knew of Sir Peter Morrison's possible involvement in child abuse in North Wales
In July I wrote about Sir Peter Morrison and the rumours that circulated about him in the late 1980s. Today's Daily Mail prints an extract from the new, expanded edition of Gyles Brandreth's Breaking the Code (which I mentioned a couple of days ago). Brandreth succeeded Morrison as Conservative MP for the City of Chester constituency. Brandreth, as well as discussing his own experiences at prep school, writes: The first, and only, official acknowledgement of my predecessor's possible involvement in child abuse came my way in 1996, when William Hague, then Secretary of State for Wales, came up to me ...
Today was the first of the two Dundee Doors Open Days of 2014 and, if you did not manage along today, the programme is running again tomorrow. You can read more here - including links to the venues. Amongst the West End participants is Jericho House - pictured earlier today (below) complete with banner!
I took an enjoyable half hour off from referendum campaigning this morning to visit the Corso Street Sheltered Lounge Coffee Morning. It was good to speak to many of the tenants of Abbotsford Street, Abbotsford Place and Corso Street and there was a great selection of stalls - see below :
Along with colleagues, I was campaigning for a "No Thanks!" vote in Broughty Ferry today - great response! Photo below :
[IMG: image] Full video here. I couldn't help noticing this smile from Alex Salmond (above) after he had finished responding to the BBC's Nick Robinson, at his (Salmond's) press conference last week. Bear in mind that Mr Salmond was responding through an amplified microphone, while Nick Robinson could only make his responses (after his initial question) in unamplified shouts, which hardly anyone could hear. Plus there was, extraordinarily, a shipped-in audience of Yes supporters, who were, obsequiously, applauding Salmond. And it had been couched, bizarrely, as an "international press conference", so that Alex Salmond could cut off Robinson, with the ...
New(-ish) from the Deputy Prime Minister's office on why it's important to protect and enhance people's connection with nature: This is the speech in which Nick Clegg announced funding for Kew Gardens and to complete England's coastal path. And of course the point about living near a park for years without knowing it would never happen to me...
[IMG: Lib Dems winning here] Here's the full list of selection contests in the coming month available for Lib Dems on the approved parliamentary candidates' list, together with the closing date for applications. The following seats have selections in progress and are currently advertising for candidates: Brentwood & Ongar, 17th September Central Suffolk and North Ipswich, 18th September Preston, 19th September Wyre & Preston North, 19th September South Dorset, 20th September Bournemouth East, 26th September Bournemouth West, 26th September Huddersfield, 26th September Leeds East, 26th September Warrington North, 30th September Warrington South, 30th September Waveney, 3rd October Grantham & Stamford, ...
Sat 13th
15:00
LibLink: Kirsty Williams - Scottish independence result will have 'colossal impact' on Wales and UK
[IMG: rally kirsty williams 1] Kirsty Wiliams, leader of the Welsh Liberal Democrats, has added her voice to those calling for Scotland to remain within the United Kingdom. Here's an excerpt of what she had to say at BBC Online: I firmly believe that Scotland should remain part of the United Kingdom. We all benefit from a stronger economy, greater national security and a powerful international voice that would be hard to match as separate states. However, Scotland must have more powers to determine its future. To simply do nothing in the event of a No vote cannot be an ...
Sat 13th
14:15
So, I watched the Rockumentary on Deep Purple and the making of Made in Japan last night on BBC Four...
via Facebook
[IMG: Web ToBCycleBath] [IMG: Web tourofbritainprizes] [IMG: Web ToBGiant] What a great stage day it was yesterday on Stage 6 of the Tour of Britain starting out from Royal Victoria Park. As a Council we worked hard with the tour and sponsors to ensure that not only was the race a great sporting success but that also the community side of it and the spectator opportunity was great. We had a cycle village in the park and touring round the stalls stopped for a chat with the cycle bath campaign group, up on the stage awarded t-shirts and certificates to ...
There are TWO events at Wapley this weekend: Wapley Bushes Bat Walk Saturday 13 September It's time to go detecting again! Join Avon Bat Group for a twilight stroll in search of bats. Bat detectors provided. Wear warm clothes and boots and bring a torch. Children must be accompanied, but they love this one, "going round the creepy woods in the dark" Meet at 7.15 pm at the Shire Way entrance to Wapley Bushes (opposite Cherington, Yate, BS37 8YA) Wapley Bushes Work Morning, Sunday 14 September This workday will be the annual stream clearance when the Conservation Group hope to ...
[IMG: lego_city_strip_club__detail_3__by_solidfact-d5uqudm] After one of my numerous attempts to live in America had not panned out, I found myself back in Shitberg, Canuckland,desperately needing work. After a week of drink drowned depression, I started hunting in the want ads every morning. The jobs I found in there were invariably terrible. I will admit to my own naiveté and desperation in answering a few of them that read along the lines of "WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE YOUR OWN BOSS?" With these "jobs" it was always the same story. You called the number provided and a woman on the other end ...
[IMG: members forum wordle] LibDemVoice has two parallel sites. The first is our public blog, the thing you're reading now. The second is our private members' forum, which only current Lib Dem members can access. If you're a member and want to chat with fellow party members about any issue that's on your mind, then why not sign up? In addition, you'll be included in our regular surveys' of party members' views. Here's some of the most active discussions this past 7 days: UK Polling; The best time to have been a party member; Scotland. A vote for separatism or ...
Local people are being asked for our views in the current Pharmaceutical Needs Assessment Consultation which is currently taking place. Every Health and Wellbeing Board has a responsibility to publish a statement of the needs for pharmaceutical services ('chemists' ) of the population in its area. The assessment considers a number of issues including: population density, opening hours, access to pharmacies, prescription numbers, locations of chemists etc. The Assessment is an important document which is used to inform decisions about applications for new chemists or changes to existing arrangements. So far in the consultations that have been undertaken it has ...
A number of local residents have been in touch about a licence reivew which is taking place of 'Cuckoo' on Bury New Road. Basically a license review of the premises has been triggered following complaints from local residents. A hearing by Licensing Panel will take place on 26 September 2014 (2.00pm at the Town Hall). Members of the public can attend, only people who are formally involved will be asked to speak. The deadline for making a submission about the issue has passed over a week ago. I know a number of people have only just found out about the ...
There is a vacancy for a Visiting Warden at the Charles Lane Trust (of which I am a Trustee) in Hall Green. The Trust has 12 bungalows for the elderly located at the junction of Fox Hollies Road and School Road. The Visiting Warden needs to be able to work for 10 hours per week (2 hours per day) and is paid at The Living Wage. Full details including a job description and an application form are available from The Clerk to the Charles Lane Trust email dhhackett@blueyonder.co.uk or 0121 246 3625.
A couple of residents have been in touch about problems with parking at the bottom of Heywood Old Road, in the area where Rochdale (very unhelpfully) put double yellow lines a few years ago. As I understand parking attendants have been attempting to ticket residents who park on the grass verge area. This is obviously causing problems for people who have nowhere else to park near to their own homes. I have asked Bury Council to liaise with Rochdale to see if a sensible solution can be found to the problem, and I'll keep people posted if anything can be ...
I'm a great, if slightly awkward, supporter of No More Page 3. Awkward, because I'd love to be more involved, but I also don't want to stray the boundary between right-on supporting of basic decency and being a man talking about what women do with their bodies, which is slightly more problematic. I support the campaign for a very simple reason - we live in a culture where people are sexualised from an incredibly young age and if there's a really small change that can be made that will mean that images of sexualised, topless women aren't seen by children, ...
It ended up being buried by this week's news from Scotland and the Royal Baby – but the Lib Dem pre-manifesto was launched this week. You can read Stephen Tall's initial take on it here and watch Nick Clegg hail it as "a manifesto for the next generation" in this video:
Saturday: There are two problems with my writing a review of "Robot of Sherwood". Pressure of work is one, and the other is that beyond saying it was laugh-out-loud hilarious but that ending with the golden arrow is a total fail, what is there to say? And everyone else has said those things already. Capaldi is a great comic actor, and here he's at his most Malcolm Tucker-alike, especially in the exchanges with Robin in the dungeon. Dressed in black, getting robbed by Robin Hood, he's very nearly the villain for the first act, particularly the "thwarted again" face Capaldi ...
A new planning application has been received within Holyrood Ward as below: Two storey side extension; Single storey extension at rear; Decking and steps at rear 2 Brooklawn Drive, Prestwich, Manchester, M25 2GS Ref. No: 57958 Received: Mon 08 Sep 2014 Please do not hesitate to get in touch if you require further information or help with this. The details will be on the Council's website here. Tim
A new planning application has been received within Holyrood Ward as below: First floor extension at side 2 Maple Grove, Prestwich, Manchester, M25 3DQ Ref. No: 57962 Received: Tue 09 Sep 2014 Please do not hesitate to get in touch if you require further information or help with this. The details will be on the Council's website here. Tim
[IMG: Carmichael at Lib Dem No Rally] On Thursday night an all-star cast of Liberal Democrat giants addressed a rally of party members and supporters in Edinburgh. We had 2 Cabinet Ministers, 2 former and a current Scottish leader, 3nformer federal leaders and one of my political heroes, Shirley Williams. I had had a quick read of Alistair Carmichael's speech before the event, so I really have no excuse for the fact that it made me cry when he delivered it. The way he talked about taking his 5 week old baby to the polling station to vote for change ...
[IMG: green_laws] The Liberal Democrat manifesto will include plans for five new laws to protect the environment, it has been announced. The manifesto plans include include legal targets for clean air and water, an end to dirty coal power stations and an ambitious decarbonisation target for the electricity sector. Liberal Democrats in government have worked hard to keep the environment at the top of the agenda. The party wants to go further and build on their achievements in Government in areas including Britain's rise in renewable energy, the Green Investment Bank and record investment in our railways. The plans include ...
Sat 13th
11:00New LDV members' survey now live: your views on Scotland, the Coalition, ISIS and Israel/Palestine, ...
[IMG: image] The new LDV members' survey is now live. So if you are one of the 1,500+ registered members of the Liberal Democrat Voice forum — and any paid-up party member is welcome to join — then you now have the opportunity to make your views known. Questions we're asking this month include: do you support or oppose Scotland becoming independent? which Lib Dem backbencher you'd most like to see promoted to ministerial office; what you think should be done about ISIS and your views on Israel/Palestine; who you want to see be elected Party President; your chance to ...
Wednesday's Acocks Green Ward Committee meeting was a relatively well attended event, in part no doubt due to the agenda, but probably also in part due to it being held centrally, in the Library. New attendees included Mushtaq Hussain, who will be the Council's new Service Lead for Yardley District and Mohammed Irfan who will be looking after Community Chest Applications from now on. The key agenda items were: 1) An update on the Warwick Road Local Sustainable Transport Funding (LSTF) works. Phil Santos and Jaswant Chahal reported for the Council and Mark Weaver attended on bebalf of Fitzgerald Construction, ...
Nick Robinson of the BBC demonstrates the self-awareness that he's famous for: Poll finding that should ice any MP's veins : @ICMResearch find that main reason for Scots voting YES is "Westminster's style of politics". — Nick Robinson (@bbcnickrobinson) September 13, 2014 Related PostsTrafigura, again Another British political tradition ends
[IMG: Miners Statue for St Just] Help bring this 7 foot statue, designed by Colin Caffell, to our area Miners Statue for St Just project needs a final bit of support to make the dream become a reality. The idea emerged many years ago that St Just-in-Penwith, a district famous for its mining heritage, should have a statue as a commemoration of the significance of the industry to the area and a memorial to those who gave their lives. Sadly one of the leaders of the project, Bernard Rees, died without his dream being realised and I feel it would ...
Claimants will be forced to visit job centres for 35 hours a week or face sanctions (tags: ) Hands down, people without kids have better lives—except for this one major thing (tags: ) 10 Female Revolutionaries That You Probably Didn't Learn About In History class (tags: ) If Pokemon Were Named By British People - VERY VERY SWEARY. Worth it for the payoff. (tags: ) Worth a punt: design the back of the new £1 coin; win ten grand to boot. (tags: ) What's different about sex after a C-section? (entire website NSFW) I haven't had a caesarian, but I ...
As a frequent visitor to the historic city of York, which can be a busy place any day of the year, I like (even as an atheist) the tranquil surroundings of Holy Trinity Church. It is now out of use as a place of worship but is maintained by the Churches Conservation Trust. The site is totally surrounded by shops and businesses yet a walk through the gate takes you to a quiet and beautiful place where you can sit down either inside the church or in its small grounds to take the weight off. A real delight. Here are ...
As economic issues have come to the fore in the referendum campaign, I find myself, oddly, sympathising with both sides in the debate, not for what they are saying, but for what they can't say. You can imagine the story lines: In an astonishing admission that has left the Yes campaign in tatters, Alex Salmond has accepted that the markets will be adversely affected in the short-term by a vote for independence. or; The Better Together campaign was in free fall yesterday when Alistair Darling agreed that an independent Scotland would be economically viable and could be more prosperous in ...
Via Jonathan Calder, the words of a Telegraph 'political commentator': For very good reasons, Britain's political parties do not campaign on election day. This will likely confuse all of you reading this who are involved in politics, though I'm sure we'll all be glad to know that we get polling day off after those long campaigns. All that getting up at 5am to deliver the first leaflet of the day, followed by hours of knocking on doors and more delivery must just have been a recurring bad dream I had every May. Or it may just be that we don't ...
Sat 13th
08:55
Watch and laugh: Clarke and Dawe - Australian Voting to be Outsourced. Millions Saved.
More comedy genius from Australia's Clarke and Dawe: You can also watch this on YouTube.
[IMG: fantasy politics] This week's internationals mean no English Premiership action so no further update: positions are as they were at the end of Week 3. Which gives me the opportunity to preview Demos Fantasy Politics which operates throughout the party conference season. All you have to do is select a dream-team of up to nine MPs, three from each party: you have until the start of Labour's on 20th September, a week today, to enter your team. I'm part of the judging team for the Lib Dem conference. Further details as below... As conference season approaches Demos Fantasy Politics ...
In the Spectator, Fraser Nelson details some remarkable threats by leading SNP politician, Jim Sillars: Sillars is a former SNP deputy leader but now not part of the apparatus- so he can speak freely. All too freely, as it turns out. Here's what he has said today. "This referendum is about power, and when we get a Yes majority, we will use that power for a day of reckoning with BP and the banks. The heads of these companies are rich men, in cahoots with a rich English Tory Prime Minister, to keep Scotland's poor, poorer through lies and distortions. ...
While the physical book is not yet available (though you can pre-order it for delivery at the end of last month), you can buy Tales Of The Great Detectives now in DRM-free epub and mobi (Kindle) formats. It has the best short story I've ever written, and seven more great short stories about the various [...]
Opposition to austerity has given new impetus to Scottish Nationalism yet independence would ironically mean Scots enduring more austerity In a scathing post on his Mainly Macro blog, Oxford Uni economics professor Simon Wren-Lewis dissects the claims made about the fiscal position of an independent Scotland. He observes that the' independent and impartial' IFS has indicated that an independent Scotland [...]
